THE OPERA AIN'T OVER UNTIL THE MAD SCENE IS ALL SCREAMED OUT

      Monday evening March 3, Mr. Deasy actually deigned to attend the Valley Education Action Committee Parent Partnership for Public Education at Portola Middle School in Tarzana.  The evening got off to a lackluster start with a press conference put on to publicize the Repairs not iPads campaign on facebook that United Teachers Los Angeles has been promoting.  This is certainly an important issue and one emblematic of the corruption that is the LAUSD, ignoring issues of health and safety and access to facilities in order to pay for pet projects that serve only to make the filthy rich richer and more filthy but not one word was mentioned of teacher jail. After speeches by Warren Fletcher, Matthew Kogan, David Lyell, Colleen Schwab, Lisa Karahalios and others we adjourned to the auditorium.

     The first part of the interview dealt with such mundane inanities such as Mr. Deasy's first job – paper route – and I think his favorite color and some other drivel.  I of course zoned out on this part because it is so obviously a waste of time to talk about the biography that we can read for ourselves online.

     Now comes the juicy part. Mr. Deasy was asked a question about what recourse a parent has in the situation where his/her child is bored in math class. It is a given that all children in Tarzana are gifted of course, one only has to look at census data for income to know that, so one expects such a question from concerned parents. After a rambling disposition on the mathematics course of study in high school (algebra 1, geometry, algebra 2 then a test or was it algebra 1 and 2 and trigonometry and statistics and? ...) Mr. Deasy, who used to teach high school mathematics, (!) was coaxed by our indefatigable mistress of ceremonies whose name I didn't catch because she mumbled, coaxed and prodded him back on topic. His summary was just as incomprehensible but no matter, things got better, more entertaining and more bizarre. 

      Mr. Deasy fielded a very reformy question about excessive testing of students in school and the use of test data in teacher evaluations. Again we were treated to a bizarre disputation on the need for some people to mind your own beeswax Dr. Diane Ravitch because you are just an education historian and leave the superintending to those who know how to superintend. Mr. Deasy was not done, digging even deeper into his own morass of newspeak, he reminded us that drivers, doctors and attorneys are tested and nobody says that this is too much. Huh??? We don't expect children to drive, treat the sick or practice law so where did this come from? We also don't tie teacher salaries to the bar exam, medical boards or the driving test.  En espanol se llama cantinflar pero el benemerito Mario Moreno made a lot more sense hasta cuando era borracho, pendejo.*

    Now comes the ugly part. Our indefatigable and sincere mistress of ceremonies asked about teacher jail. Mr. Deasy lied and said that 80-90% of us in teacher jail are there because the district was notified by law enforcement that they are being investigated. Bull shit. This is categorically untrue as anyone familiar with our situation knows that any story told by anybody can be used by an administrator to land a teacher in teacher jail. Mr. Deasy, digging an ever deeper hole with his own tongue, went on to say that the district has to wait for law enforcement to conclude its investigation before they can tell the teacher inmate anything and if law enforcement clears us then back to school.  Pure fabrication. The time that a teacher sits in jail before hearing of his/her charges is usually spent by the district trying to gather more perjured testimony. Que clase de pendejo cree en sus proprias mentiras?* Now it gets even better. Some jailed teachers yelled, “Liar!” At this Mr. Deasy started yelling “I don't go to your house and yell at you!!” I didn't know he lives in the Portola MS auditorium.  Maybe he hasn't come to my house  but he must think that the lie he tells about us every chance he gets makes it all okay. He screamed, “You don't have to look in the eyes of a child that has been sexually abused!!” 

     This is not just crazy talk, this is pure evil. He didn't come right out and call us child sexual predators but there is no difference in his message. He meant to tar us with the very same brush. This de-humanizing of teachers is how every great evil starts. If you paint Black men as a danger to white women or Mexicans as a danger to our way of life then what is to stop the progression to lynchings, racism, bigotry and even the gas chamber? All of the great evils of history begin like this and just as in this case they always have the love of money as their foundation. Racism allows the wealthy to exclude some people from fair wages and access to services and Mr. Deasy means to exclude us from our profession in order to make money available for his masters. 

NOTE FOR THOSE WHO DON'T SPEAK SPANGLISH;
1.  In Spanish it's called cantinflar (talk like Cantinflas) but the great Mario Moreno (the actor who played  Cantinflas) made more sense even when he was drunk, dummy. (Not Mario Moreno)
2.  What kind of fool believes his own lies? 

With Friends Like These...

 

We now have the birthdates of all Unjustly Jailed LAUSD Teachers .  After two and a half years of stonewalling and sandbagging by UTLA and LAUSD our committee chair Arlene Schery and UTLA director Lisa Karahalios filed a freedom of information act request with the LAUSD.  Here is what Arlene Schery writes about the data;

 

I have personally collated the list of 498. The results are 459 of the 498 are over 40 which is 93% Only 39 were under 40 and of those 39 10 were age 39 and will be 40 in the next few months. Unless the general population of teachers is 93% over age 40 then we have proof of age discrimination and need to begin an age discrimination case NOW. As chair of unjustly housed teacher committee. I demand we do this immediately. This is no longer heresay but proven fact. Arlene Schery

 

 

Where will UTLA go with this information?  Valley West director Scott Mandel, who represents our interests on the UTLA board of directors, wrote this addressed to UTLA president Warren Fletcher and cc'd to many others; 

While our leadership has been trying to go the PERB route to get info on who is in teacher jail, Arlene, the chair of the committee, got the info through the Freedom of information act.  Her data is below.

93% of all teachers in teacher jail have been over 40.  Just what we thought.

Now--Warren--and this isn't a political stunt, I know you're reading this.  WILL YOU AUTHORIZE OUR LAWYERS TO FILE AN AGE DISCRIMINATION SUIT NOW???

I would like an answer on this listserve this weekend.

If not, I am calling for Board members to ask for an emergency Board meeting for the purpose of addressing this issue, and authorizing our lawyers to file the age-discrimination suit.

We have the OFFICIAL data.  Let's do this now.  Everyone on every slate/support can come together on this issue and make this unanimous.

In Unity,

Scott Mandel

Director, Valley East

This is a development a long time in coming and the information could have been secured much earlier.  

 

There will be one last presidential candidates forum on Tuesday March 4, at the Boyle Heights City Hall  2130 East 1st Street, Los Angeles, CA 90033 two blocks east of the 5 freeway.  The forum is being hosted by the astroturf (astroturd) group Educators for Excellence.  This is a reformy privateer group that wants to destroy teaching as a career.  Don't you love the Orwellian double speak?  If they are for excellence then what does that say about the rest of us?  E4E invited only their members but I don't think that they have the authority to keep us out of a public building that we paid for. 

 

Here's how it all comes together.  I just sent this open letter to the candidates;

An open letter to all candidates for United Teachers Los Angeles president:

 

I have attended two of the candidates forums and have submitted the following question each time. Both times my question has been ignored. As the forum organized by E4E is the very last one I insist that all of you answer my question concerning the LAUSD policy of targeting experienced teachers for abuse and termination. At the last candidates forum I was promised by the election committee that my question would be first but it was ignored. I understand that E4E is an astroturf group dedicated to the privateer agenda but I don't think that they should be allowed to determine the agenda of the UTLA election.

 

Here is my question:

Based upon the LAUSD's own accounting, superintendent Deasy has targeted older teachers for abuse and termination based upon false charges. Thousands have lost jobs. UTLA has been unable or unwilling to defend us against this attack. What do you propose to do going forward to confront the issue of falsely accused and unjustly dismissed teachers? What remedy can you offer to those that have already lost their jobs? How will you deal with the denial of due process by the LAUSD and what will you do about teachers that have been dismissed based upon perjured testimony? Will you confront the targeting of certain groups of teachers by gender, race, and discipline that is, special education teachers are targeted at a higher rate than regular education teachers?

I will be in attendance.

Michael Dominguez