Ruining careers for $475/month (18 month term)

[updated 1/23/11 with initial Mulgrew quotes and a link to the 1/22 NYDN article]

Iris Blige will pay a fine, less than 5% of her salary, for ruining the careers of good teachers, of developing new teachers (and of APs). She tried to ruin even more careers.

Iris Blige’s Fordham HS for the Arts was my model for the kind of school a new teacher should avoid. Do Not Apply, I wrote, this school ends careers. It was true.

Two years ago hundreds of high school teachers from across the Bronx protested yet another instance of baseless discipline against a teacher. In that instance, Blige took advantage of the teacher’s immigration status to try to get her deported.

Finally OSI found this August that what we already knew was true: that Blige ordered APs to U teachers without any attempt to evaluate them, that she chose to go after, and found reasons afterwards.

The penalty? Iris Blige and Elena Papaliberios signed a stipulation just after Thanksgiving, agreeing to a $7500 fine spread out over a year and a half. Is there any word about the teachers whose careers were ruined? The question certainly needs to be brought straight to the UFT.

[edit: Mulgrew is quoted as saying “[Blige] is extremely unscrupulous in the way she does her job,” and “I think it’s outrageous. If the price for ruining someone’s career is $7,500, where’s the accountability?”]

Gotham Schools and the New York Post reported (the Post was clearer about the injustice, GS managed to misuse a big word in its headline.) Chaz posted on his blog. [edit: and the New York Daily News reported]. Former District Rep Lynne Winderbaum wrote excellent commentary at GS. I reprint them, below the fold –>

Principals like Blige who ruin lives, ruin careers, rule by fear and intimidation. Signaling the robotic foolishness of Cathie Blacks talking points, Blige is an example of how the dedicated, vibrant, caring new teachers that Black wants to save from layoffs ate the ones whose careers were cut short by the vindictiveness of this principal. Bishop, Hidalgo, Street, Troy, all popular and well-liked young teachers, were cut down early in their promising careers.

On one occasion a student at the school asked me “why does Ms. Blige get rid if all our favorite teachers?”

So harsh were the conditions under her tyranny that from 2007-2008 she had a turnover rate of 70.5%. Dozens of teachers have left every year since 2004 because of this principal. Of the more than a dozen APs in her school in fewer than since 2004, at least ten have left many testifying against her in this investigation and others. Evaluations, which are designed to improve instruction in the classroom, were being instead subverted into a tool to intimidate teachers and stifle dissent.

The fact that the DOE doesn’t terminate Blige should serve as a dire warning for anyone who believes that the can evaluate leadership for our schools. Principals like Iris Blige are not instructional leaders but people who maintain their power by using their authority to rate staff to impose their will.

Iris Blige who, when she was not giving out unjust ratings and firing new teachers, was sending them to the rubber room for petty or no reason.
A former UFT chapter leader, Rick Coscia, spent two years on trumped up charges which were ultimately dropped. Fannie Davis, a twenty-seven year award- winning teacher, spent two years on an allegation coerced from AP Ahmed Edwards. There were never any charges, investigation, or decision. Her “crime” was that she exercised her right to file a Step 2 grievance for improper excessing. When she returned from the hearing, Blige had her promptly shipped to the rubber room by forcing Edwards to say Davis threatened her or she would deny him tenure.

Blige claimed that Raqnel James also threatened her. After an unblemished eight-year teaching career, this beloved teacher found herself facing deportation when Blige falsely charged her as well. The District Attorney has now asked for twelve postponements over two years as James is dragged through the court system.

After over 400 students, teachers, and even administrators demonstrated against her in March 2009, she threatened every student who partcipated. She sent a guidance counselor to tell them they would not get their diplomas. She told them they could not participate in student activities. She threw one girl off the School Leadership Team. Robert Small, the OSI investigator was given a list of 13 such students to interview.

The result? A fine. Good luck NYC.