America is criminalizing Black teachers: Atlanta’s cheating scandal and the racist underbelly of education reform

Apparently Atlanta is a lot like San Diego. When illegal activity happens in a school, local officials handle the issue in two very different ways. When the wrongdoer is an adult with political connections, taxpayer money is poured into that person's defense, and the schools go into cover-up mode. On the other hand, if the wrongdoer has no political connections, the school goes after him or her with a vengeance. The justice system stands ready to support schools and other public entities. You're fighting an uphill battle when you want justice from a pubic entity. See Depraved in Poway and series of posts about shenanigans in Poway.  Adults in San Diego County schools usually misbehave with impunity, but kids who do the same thing are called "depraved." There was an amazing case at Guajome Park Academy where teachers improperly changed grades, but instead of censuring the teacherd, the school sued a whistle-blower kid who hacked the school computer to prove the wrongdoing.
 
See also my comparison of the Atlanta cheating scandal and the bizarre color-coordinated indictments of school officials in San Diego.


America is criminalizing Black teachers: Atlanta’s cheating scandal and the racist underbelly of education reform
Our educational system stacks the deck against Black children -- now we're throwing their teachers in jail Brittney Cooper
Wednesday, Apr 8, 2015
Salon 

Former Atlanta Public Schools school research team director Tamara Cotman, center, is led to a holding cell after a jury found her guilty in the Atlanta Public Schools test-cheating trial, Wednesday, April 1, 2015, in Atlanta. (Credit: AP/Kent D. Johnson)

Last week, an Atlanta jury convicted 11 teachers and school administrators of racketeering in a system-wide cheating scandal. Yes, you read that correctly. Teachers and administrators inflating student scores on standardized tests is now considered “organized crime” in this country, and is punishable by more 20 years in prison, in these cases.

I am an educator. I am a Black woman who may someday mother a Black child. I have taught other Black mothers’ children. Much of my educational success in elementary school is directly attributable to high performance on standardized tests that caused my white teachers to notice me and intervene on my behalf to get me “tracked” into higher-achieving classrooms. I believe all children deserve access to a good, high-quality, public education.

Therefore, I don’t have to condone cheating in any form (and I don’t) to assert that what has happened in Atlanta to these teachers is a travesty. The pictures that emerged last week of handcuffed Black schoolteachers being led out of Southern courtrooms in one of the country’s largest urban Black school systems were absolutely heartbreaking.

Scapegoating Black teachers for failing in a system that is designed for Black children, in particular, not to succeed is the real corruption here. Since the early 1990s, we have watched the deprofessionalization of teaching, achieved through the proliferation of “teacher fellow” programs and the massive conservative-led effort to defund public education in major urban areas throughout the country. There is no longer a consensus that a good public education — a hallmark of American democracy — should be considered a public good.

Black children have for generations been the primary victims of this continuing social mendacity about the national value of education. More than 51 percent of children who attend public schools live in poverty. In Georgia, the percentage of Black children living in poverty hovers right around 39 percent. For Latino children, the number is consistently over 40 percent. Nationally, the number for Black children is 39 percent, according to most recent data, and 33 percent for Latino youth...

Read more at http://www.salon.com/2015/04/08/america_is_criminalizing_black_teachers_atlantas_cheating_scandal_and_the_racist_underbelly_of_education_reform/?source=newsletter

The Atlanta Public Schools cheating verdicts: How to deal with illegal behavior by teachers and school administrators? Indict some black or brown people.

See also Brittney Cooper's Salon article.

The Atlanta Public Schools test cheating case proves a couple of things:

1) Teachers and administrators lie under oath.  I knew that before the Atlanta case.  I've claimed this for several years, based on personal experience at my school district, but a lot of people simply didn't want to believe me.

2) If you're a corrupt teacher or school administrator, your chances of being charged with a crime are miniscule--unless you're black or brown.

In my case in Chula Vista Elementary School District, the teachers and school officials who committed illegal acts were overwhelmingly white.  The school board consisted of four white members and one Mexican.

I reported the wrongdoing to District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, and was ignored.

Imagine my surprise a few years later when 15 officials in neighboring school districts were indicted and eventually pleaded guilty to corruption charges.  These 15 individuals were overwhelmingly Mexican.

Ironically, one of these indicted officials was Bertha Lopez, the only Mexican among the five board members who violated the law in my case, including violations of Labor Code 1102.5 and 432.7 (a section with criminal penalties).  Bertha made the mistake of leaving CVESD and running for office in Sweetwater Union High School District.  She ended up pleading guilty to a ridiculous charge: accepting a gift over the state limit.

In Chula Vista, Lopez and her four white colleagues committed illegal acts that harmed children at Castle Park Elementary in order to protect law-breaking adults who were in political favor at the time.    I think that this sort of direct undermining of the education of children is a far more serious form of corruption than accepting a gift.

Students were harmed by the rogue group of teachers at my school. This self-styled "Castle Park Family"was protected by the district when its illegal actions were exposed, while at the same time, many good teachers were forced out.  The power-hungry teachers chewed up and spit out 11 principals in 11 years, enabled a $20,000 embezzlement by a PTA-president crony, and cost the district $100,000s in legal fees and increased liability insurance premiums. Finally the district decided that the teachers in charge of Castle Park Elementary were out of control, it tried to transfer some of them out of the school.

Here are a couple of recent cases that illustrates contempt for the law among white school boards:
Elaine Allyn case in Fallbrook--violations of Labor Code 1102.5
Sharon McClain case in Del Mar

Interestingly, Patrick Judd, one of the board members in my case, was found liable in civil court for sexual harassment of an employee.