We Have a Winner!

The voting is complete, and we have a winner in the most closely-fought battle yet for the not necessarily prestigious Curmie Award, bestowed each year on the person or institution who most embarrasses the profession of education. And the winner is… (fanfare… drum roll…) Principal Greer Phillips of PS 79 (the Horan School) in East Harlem.

Ms. Phillips ordered a lockdown drill at PS 79, complete with false claims of an armed intruder—without notifying either the faculty or the police that it was only a drill—in a school with a high percentage of special needs kids less than a week after the events in Newtown, Connecticut last December. It was this incident, indeed, that led me to decide that events “from late 2012 that didn’t find their way into the public perception (or at least into mine) until 2013” were still eligible for this year’s Curmie. It struck me at the time I wrote about this story last January 26 that boneheadedness of this caliber should not be excluded from Curmie consideration just because I hadn’t seen the story until after the new year. Apparently, you (collectively) agreed.

In all, 46 people voted, with 109 total votes cast in the open balloting which allowed readers to vote for as many nominees as they chose. Principal Phillips was named on 19 ballots, narrowly claiming the crown from some tough competition: Principal Tracey Perkins of Cypress Lake (FL) High School got 17 votes for punishing a student who disarmed a classmate who was carrying a loaded gun; officials at Dietrich High School in Idaho and at Batavia High School in Illinois collected 16 apiece for punishing teachers who said the word “vagina” in a biology classroom and reminding students of their 5th amendment rights before administering a survey that could well have led to self-incrimination, respectively. [Carla Scuzzarella of Andover (MA) High School also registered 16 votes, but new information about the Erin Cox case suggests at least the distinct possibility that Dr. Scuzzarella did nothing wrong.]

Principal Valerie Lara-Black of Mary Blair Elementary School in Loveland, Colorado was next in line with 10 votes for suspending a 2nd-grader who threw an imaginary grenade into an imaginary box containing “something evil.” Principal John Hynes of Grace Brethren High School in Simi Valley, California got 9 nods for changing the grades of at least one student, possibly more… including his own daughter. The board shares in his honorable mention for not firing him. Finally, the unnamed teacher who poured pencil shavings into the open mouth of a 13-year-old student at Boles Junior High in Arlington, Texas (and, again, the authorities who let her off with a short suspension) rounds out the finalists with 8 votes.

A few thoughts… First, I really had no dog in this fight. I was a little surprised that the pencil-shavings incident didn’t attract more votes, not because it necessarily deserved them, but only because it seemed closest to the kind of outrageous behavior by teachers which won two years ago and copped the first two places last year. Similarly, the outright dishonesty of John Hynes struck me as uniquely problematic. But they were, perhaps, perceived as anomalies—after all, the voting guidelines did say, “a thoroughly heinous but isolated act shouldn’t necessarily get your vote over a less outrageous action that might be seen as either an exemplar of a systemic problem or a harbinger of bad things to come.”

Punishing students and faculty for doing nothing wrong (a 2nd grader “saving the world”), or indeed for doing something specifically right—disarming a gunman, reminding students of constitutional rights, using the correct terminology for human anatomy—these are the deeply troubling glimpses into the world of educational administration. Even Curmie isn’t cynical enough to suggest that this is the norm, but it sure does seem to be approaching it. It’s all about following the rules even if they’re irrelevant, submitting to authority even if it’s overweening, coddling parents unless they have a legitimate concern. Because, you see, a). we mean well and b). we know best.

Curmie calls bullshit.

Nonetheless, it’s difficult to argue with the collective wisdom of Curmiphiles. Principal Phillips managed to do something not merely colossally stupid, but arrogant, cruel, smug, unethical, insensitive, reckless, boorish, and—oh, yeah—illegal, as well. Plus, in the kneejerk world of post-Newtown, it also succeeded in being an emblem of everything that makes me crazy about the world of public education and self-righteous liberal do-gooding.

I may not have had a preference among the finalists at the beginning of the voting, but you have convinced me that the right person won. I’ll send the Curmie along to her, but perhaps first I should call her up and tell her that there’s a serial killer waiting for her in her apartment and that he’s amusing himself by setting her cat on fire. She won’t really appreciate the Curmie until she gets out of therapy, anyway, right?

Announcing the Nominations for the 3rd Annual Curmie Award

It’s that time again: the nominations for the 3rd annual Curmie Awards for the person or institution who most embarrasses the profession of education. I remind you that the award is not for the most egregious act, but the one that shows the profession in the worst light. That is, a thoroughly heinous but isolated act shouldn’t necessarily get your vote over a less outrageous action that might be seen as either an exemplar of a systemic problem or a harbinger of bad things to come.

As usual, the transgressions in question must be directly related to the profession, to someone acting in an official capacity: junior high teachers who sleep with their students are abhorrent, but there’s nothing about that act that links directly to education. That there are unethical teachers is not news, and the same person might initiate a similar relationship with a child s/he knows through church, Little League, or the neighborhood.

Also, the recipient must be, at some level, an actual educator. Hence, the outrageous institutionalization of restricting academic freedom by the Kansas Board of Regents doesn’t qualify: those folks are political appointees, not educators… that’s both the problem and the reason those censorious asshats (another tip of the cap to the folks at Popehat for that expression) won’t get a Curmie… or at least a regular, voted-on-by-the-readership one. I reserve the right to give them a special Curmie, along the same lines as the one awarded recently to the Florida Fifth Circuit Count of Appeals for forcing the Osceola County School District to put 2012 Curmie winner Lillian Gomez back in the classroom because feeding hot sauce-laced crayons to autistic kids is “not so egregious such that loss of effectiveness could be decided as a matter of law.”

There are two changes from previous practice. It’s still the case that I must have written about the events in question during 2013, but I’m expanding the time parameters a little to allow stories from late 2012 that didn’t find their way into the public perception (or at least into mine) until 2013. And all nominees must be in the United States (I suppose this isn’t a change, per se, but this year I need to make the rule explicit because of a story from Canada).

I tried to balance different types of professional infractions: teachers behaving badly, administrative arrogance, rampaging nannyism, and so on. Curmie’s civil libertarianism will be well in evidence, as will his version of the domino theory: if Awful Thing X is allowed to take place without outcry, then surely Awful Thing Y will be next.

Curmie wrote a lot fewer posts in 2013 than in previous years—40, as opposed to 79 in 2012 and 101 in 2011. That means that there were a lot of stories I didn’t get to: nothing about the prom follies in Missouri (two different places) and Indiana, the 14-year-old arrested for wearing a pro-NRA shirt, the utter idiocy of Georgia higher education Chancellor Hank Huckaby’s comments about “students’ studying the wrong areas,” the California school that allowed cops to entrap a special needs student on a drug offense, the silliness of the Kentucky High School Athletic Association proclaimed new standards for post-game handshakes, the SAT’s “lying is the best policy” approach to essay grading, the Colorado school that charged a 6-year-old with sexual harassment, the Washington school that apparently sees nothing wrong with forcing students to open their Facebook accounts to the prurient gaze of administrators, SUNY Oswego officials who placed a journalism student on interim suspension for telling prospective commenters for a feature story that “what you say… does not have to be positive,”… and more.

Still, I managed over a dozen posts featuring some 28 different stories, and the hard part wasn’t finding enough Curmie-worthy prospects, but in narrowing the list to eight finalists and eight (dis)honorable mentions. There were nine (yes, nine) segments about stupid gun-related regulations that have nothing to do with actual safety issues (toy guns that really do look like real guns would be another matter). All of these incidents were outrageous, but six of them didn’t even get dishonorable mention status, in part because that would load up the nominations with a particular kind of idiocy, when there are so many from which to choose. Also not making the cut were a couple of displays of administrative stupidity stemming from a combination of humorlessness, hyper-literalism and arrogant nannyism. No attempts to shut down high school theatre productions made the list, either, although there was one strong contender and another case I didn’t get the chance to write about. It turns out that all the finalists are from the world of elementary and secondary education: one teacher, one private school administrator, six public school administrators. There are a couple of college administrations on the DisHonorable Mention list, but this is the year of public and private schools.

But enough about what isn’t on the list. We move on to the DisHonorable Mentions for the 2013 Curmie Award, in the order I wrote about them:

Life Learning Academy in San Francisco for suspending Courtni Webb and threatening her with expulsion for writing a poem in a personal notebook that expressed some empathy for Newtown killer Adam Lanza.

Newlin Fell Elementary School in South Philadelphia for screaming at, searching, and otherwise humiliating 5th-grader Melody Valentin for having a piece of paper torn into the very rough outline of gun, which she was in the process of throwing away.

The unnamed teacher at Cleveland High School in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, for ridiculing 9th grader (and African-American) Christopher Rougier for dressing up as Santa because “Santa Claus is white.” (Apparently elves and reindeer can be black, however: just thought you might want to know that, Gentle Reader.)

The Glendale (CA) Unified School District for hiring a private company to spy on the social media posts of their students, a process which is either illegal and unconstitutional or doomed to ineffectuality.

The Cleveland State University chapter of the AAUP for claiming that $666 raises are tantamount to accusations of Satanism.

The University of Massachusetts for cancelling all electronic dance music concerts on campus because attendees often use the potent Ecstasy variant known as “Molly.”

Mike Scott, the football coach at Annandale (VA) High School, for throwing the school’s marching band off the field in the middle of their senior night halftime show despite there being plenty of time remaining on the clock, and Principal Vincent Randazzo for doing next to nothing to punish the bullying coach.

Hillcrest Middle School in Simpsonville, South Carolina for suspending an autistic student for showing older students a cartoonish drawing of a bomb.

And now… The nominees for the 3rd Annual Curmie Awards…. (drum roll…)

Principal Greer Phillips of PS 79 (the Horan School) in East Harlem for conducting a completely unannounced (to teachers, to the police…) lockdown drill less than a week after the horrors at Sandy Hook Elementary. In aggravation: outrageous timing and an incompetently run drill complete with contradictory instructions, but also the makeup of the student body (a high percentage of students with emotional or cognitive problems). In mitigation: I can’t think of a thing.

Principal Valerie Lara-Black of Mary Blair Elementary School in Loveland, Colorado for suspending 2nd-grader Alex Evans for throwing an imaginary grenade into an equally imaginary box containing “something evil.” In aggravation: this is stupid behavior even if there’s something tangible. In mitigation: there’s probably some idiotic zero tolerance policy that purports to justify if not demand these flights of inanity.

Principal Tracey Perkins of Cypress Lake (FL) High School for suspending a 16-year-old student because he disarmed another student, a football player who was threatening a teammate with a loaded gun. You see, he was “involved in an incident in which a weapon was present.” In aggravation: apart from the sheer idiocy of the charges, they were changed after the school started being (quite rightly) embarrassed by the publicity. In mitigation: it is possible that the boy was indeed uncooperative with the ensuing investigation.

Principal Carla Scuzzarella of North Andover (MA) High School for stripping Erin Cox from her volleyball team captaincy and suspending her for five games because she went by a party where there was alcohol long enough to drive a drunken friend home. In aggravation: the police statement makes it clear that Ms. Cox had not been drinking, and the policy manual makes a specific point about the folly of guilt by association. In mitigation: there are reports that she was at the party longer than it would have taken just to collect her friend.  [EDIT: the follow-up on this case shown in the link provided by Renee in the comments below makes it clear that Ms. Cox may well not be the victim here, and that school authorities behaved appropriately.   Whereas there is little corroboration of the assertions in that news story (which seems to have been written by someone with an agenda of his own), Curmie apologizes to Principal Scuzzarella for what seems likely to have been a false accusation.  It is impossible to remove this nomination from the ballot, but I urge you not to vote for Ms. Scuzzarella.  If you have already voted, you can indeed change your vote.]

Officials at Dietrich (ID) High School for reporting science teacher Tim McDaniel to the school board and the state professional standards commission, allegedly for using the word “vagina.” Yes, in a biology class. In aggravation: Mr. McDaniel seems to be being penalized for the precise reason that he was doing his job. In mitigation: it is unclear to what extent the school per se was responsible for the brouhaha, although they clearly did little to prevent it.

Batavia (IL) High School and their equally incompetent school board for punishing social studies teacher John Dryden. His crime? Reminding his students of their 5th amendment rights while distributing a survey that could indeed have led to self-incrimination. In aggravation: the survey, with students’ name on it, was a clear invasion of student privacy, motivated by the usual nannyish hogwash. In mitigation: Dryden did react without checking with school officials about the intents of the survey.

The unnamed teacher at Boles Junior High in Arlington, Texas for pouring pencil shavings into the mouth of 8th-grader Marquis Jay, and to the authorities who cravenly gave her a slap on the wrist. In aggravation: you need aggravation??? In mitigation: the boy deserved some punishment—he was at best inattentive—and it seems to have been an unpremeditated and isolated incident.

Principal John Hynes of Grace Brethren High School in Simi Valley, California for the completely unauthorized action of changing the grades of at least one student (possibly several, including his own daughter), and the spineless board who allowed him get by with little punishment. In aggravation: it’s a short step from what has been admitted to and what has been alleged, which would be an outrageous abuse of power. In mitigation: with the exception of the one case, the allegations come almost exclusively from a now-former teacher. This may not be the most objective of sources.

So… there are the nominees. As usual, you are free to object if one of your “favorites” was omitted. Likewise, I’m free to tell you to get your own damned blog if you want to make the nominations.

Please vote for the most deserving recipient(s) in the box on the upper right of this page: you may vote for as many or as few nominees as you choose, but please don’t vote more than once. If you choose to comment, please do so in addition to rather than instead of voting—regardless of what people say in the comments, either here or on the Curmudgeon Central Facebook page, it’s only the actual votes that count.

The polls, as it were, will be open until 7:00 pm CST on Wednesday, January 8. Majority rules. (This isn’t PolitiFact, after all.)

Curmie Contenders: “It's Not the Crime; It's the Cover-Up” Edition

Today’s Curmie contenders feature outrageous activity, but at some level, the problem is in the lack of response rather than the conduct per se. In other words, given the literally millions of people employed in the education profession in this country, it’s a virtual given that a few of them will do something vicious or hateful or otherwise unethical from time to time. And, as an educator myself, I understand that sometimes the frustration just boils over: probably most of us have said or done something completely out of character at least a few times. More often than not, these outbreaks are unpremeditated, “last straw” sorts of events. If not, they’re likely the result of panic—the same causes, in other words, that cause students to do stupid things like threaten teachers or plagiarize a paper.

The greater problem, then, is when an administrator who has the time and detachment to render an appropriate judgment fails to do so. Think of it this way: Curmie has probably watched a few thousand football games over the years, either live or on TV. Seldom has he seen a more egregious facemask infraction than in the 1998 game between Kansas State and Nebraska. (If you want to see the video, check here, starting at about the 5:35 mark… or you can settle for the still picture you see here.) Despite its obviousness, it wasn’t called. Nebraska fans are convinced their team would have won the game had the officials done their damned jobs. Of course, perhaps K-State would have won anyway. But one of the worst no-calls in the history of sports meant we never got a chance to find out. (It was a fourth-down play, meaning K-State got the ball when Nebraska would otherwise have been marching towards a go-ahead score.)

So who’s responsible for that result? Not the player. All those clichés about “just trying to make a play” are actually true. I have no doubt the K-State linebacker was just trying to grab onto something to make a tackle, and it happened to be the Nebraska quarterback’s facemask. And frankly, it wouldn’t matter even if it had been intentional. Should there have been a penalty and possibly even an ejection? Of course. But it wasn’t the player’s fault that things didn’t turn out that way. We expect those charged with penalizing bad behavior—judges, cops, referees, school administrators—to do their jobs. When they don’t, they, as much as those who actually violate the rules, are responsible for the negative results.

All of which brings us to Arlington, Texas, where an unnamed teacher at Boles Junior High emptied the shavings from a pencil sharpener into a student’s mouth last winter. The exact timeline of events is unclear from news reports, but we know that the event took place in January, that the suspension (or at least the announcement of it) took place “almost a month after the incident,” and that the teacher was back in the classroom by February 9. In other words, the teacher was probably suspended for about a week.

At first glance, this incident bears a good deal of resemblance to what got reigning Curmie Award winner Lillian Gomez her title: punishing a student by putting something awful in his mouth (directly or indirectly). True, there are differences—the victim in this case wasn’t a special needs student, he actually deserved some kind of punishment (he was apparently sleeping in class, which is both disrespectful of the teacher and distracting to classmates), the scheme wasn’t premeditated, and it wasn’t the child’s regular teacher. Moreover, the chances that allegations of a racial motivation are unadulterated poppycock border on ontological certitude. Nor is bloviating about parallels between the school’s response and that of Penn State’s to Jerry Sandusky (“There’s no difference between what they did and the administration at Penn State did.”) either accurate or useful.

That doesn’t make this teacher’s behavior anything but outrageous and unprofessional, and she deserved to be fired: not suspended for a few days and facing a tough reappointment review while remaining anonymous; fired, with her name announced at a press conference. OR… there really wasn’t a case at all, and the suspension itself was a miscarriage of justice.

Assuming the objective charges to be true, irrespective of what motives some attention-seeker ascribes to them, this teacher should be gone, and it’s on the school that she was able to finish at least the academic year. Curmie’s netpal Jack Marshall nails this one:

…any school administrator that wouldn’t resign and give a news conference to the local press and TV outlets if such a teacher was allowed to return to the scene of her crime is also in the wrong profession, and needs to investigate whether any bait shops are hiring. This is an example where parents and the public earn the kind of schools they get: no parent should send a child back to a school that employs teachers this untrustworthy, and the proper response to a school allowing such a teacher to return is to empty that school of students, and to demand the removal of every decision-maker within it as well as an independent review of every teacher employed there.

Jack is also right when he suggests a little later on that the union was an impediment to a just conclusion. Whereas teachers unions in particular are often accused of being the problem, even when there is no union, this time it would appear the allegations are accurate. That still doesn’t excuse the inaction of school authorities.

Our other story today comes from Simi Valley, California, where Principal John Hynes of Grace Brethren High School confessed to changing grades of at least one student and nonetheless kept his job.

Published reports are unclear about what was admitted to and what wasn’t—it appears that the pastor of the church with which the school is affiliated is claiming it was “one student in one class,” but Anke Saldarriaga, a Spanish teacher at the school last year, alleges that grades of four students in her class—including Hynes’s daughter—had been altered without her permission. If I’m reading the doublespeak correctly, the one case everyone agrees happened was not in Saldarriaga’s class. The daughter’s history grade was also changed, according to a report in the Ventura County Star.

To say that the school authorities are sending mixed messages is to err rather more on the side of understatement than of hyperbole. On the one hand, they claim that “There was an academic breach of integrity with our principal,” and that they took (unspecified) “swift and substantial disciplinary action.” On the other hand, they seem to dismiss the majority of the allegations against him, including… perhaps… the most serious one: changing the grade of his own daughter. I say “perhaps” because he won’t answer whether he changed his daughter’s grade because she’s a minor. Sure. That’s the reason you won’t answer. I believe you. My eyebrow just does that sometimes.

The one thing you don’t do, ever is change a teacher’s grades. Certainly not without consulting the teacher. Especially if it’s your kid. I get it. Christian school—they don’t have to play by the rules everyone else follows, but ought they not have more interest than their secular counterparts in academic integrity? Isn’t that part, at least, of what parents are shelling out $9K and change every year to get?

The point is that there are no doubt other principals as unethical as John Hynes. But it’s unlikely that there are many who are known to be so by both their superiors and the public and are still on the job. “Thank God the school didn’t fire me like another organization would have,” quoth Hynes. Um… I don’t think He’s the one responsible. You’re thinking of the other guy.