Year-End Wrap-Ups
Dear Year-Enders:
How would you summarize 2008 in the District of Columbia? There are
going to be only three more issues of themail in 2008, and issues around
Christmas and New Years are always short, so you’ll have plenty of
room to let your fellow correspondents know what you think were the
highlights and low-lights on your block, in your neighborhood, and in
the city as a whole. What was most notable, and what happened that will
make the most difference to us in the future?
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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Councilmembers Cheh and Bowser introduced a bill last summer
(B17-0911) that would prevent a neighborhood being designated a historic
district if a majority of the affected property owners objected. You
might think that this would be a no-brainer in a democracy, but historic
preservationists in large numbers denounced the Cheh-Bowser bill at a
council hearing on November 21. They argued that historic preservation
is a good thing for the public at large, and therefore ought to be
imposed on any neighborhood they consider “historic,” no matter if
the homeowners object. As one prominent preservationist said, historic
district designation should be based only on “merit,” not on “popular
opinion.”
Rather a lot of homeowners are objecting lately. First Brookland,
then Chevy Chase, and most recently Lanier Heights have fought back
successfully against efforts to declare their neighborhoods historic
districts. Advocates ought to worry that historic preservation has
earned such unpopularity, perhaps because of the District’s harsh
preservation law. It doesn’t matter how much it costs a homeowner to
meet historic preservation demands; if you can’t handle the steep
costs, the bureaucrats say, then sell your home and move out.
The Cheh-Bowser bill aside, proposed Historic Preservation Office
regulations would “make explicit the [Historic Preservation Review]
Board’s expectation of broad community support for proposed historic
districts.” Evidently this “expectation” did not exist in 1986,
when Mount Pleasant was declared a historic district, even as an HPRB
board member noted that “the community itself was split over the
decision.” But forget reversing that decision, despite its flawed
origin; once a neighborhood goes historic, there’s no provision for
reconsideration, no “sunset” on the designation. That’s all the
more reason that there should be “broad community support,”
confirmed by a fair poll of the affected homeowners, before any historic
district designation.
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Students Must Learn to Touch Type
Phil Shapiro, pshapiro@his.com
I was volunteering some time recently helping a ninth grade student
from Eritrea. He has a nice computer at home and a fast connection to
the Internet. For his history homework, he writes out his homework
longhand and then types it ever so slowly into his computer. I told him
in a friendly way he needs to learn to type, pronto. He tells me he’s
learning typing at school and that his teacher tells him he is “doing
very well.” Hearing that kind of feedback might lead him to believe
that he doesn’t need to practice touch typing at home. What his school
hasn’t given him is any goal or deadline for typing proficiency.
We must require all students entering high school to be typing at
thirty words per minute. Appropriate accommodation should be made for
students with impairments. There are free web site and free software
programs for learning to type. Without typing skills, our students fall
further and further behind. Naturally, any new kid moving to town who
has no computer experience in his or her previous school should be given
ninety days to get up to speed. Without these expectations in place, we
can expect failure.
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Ninety-Day Termination Plan for DC Teachers
Candi Peterson, saveourcounselors@gmail.com
Whether our eyes are wide open or shut, there can be no escape from
Rhee’s ninety-day termination plan for DC teachers. I guess the reason
that I am concerned about what is happening is because I know that DC
Public Schools has always been a retaliatory system lacking in checks
and balances. Early on in my public school career, I was riffed unfairly
by a vindictive administrator despite having above average ratings. That
experience gave me pause and made me suspect of a public school system
that allowed many administrators and principals to go unchecked and
regularly wreck havoc on programs, employees, and students, all the
while refusing to follow rules, just because they were in charge. Don’t
get me wrong — I am not saying that some teachers aren’t
ineffective. However, as former superintendent John Deasey of PG County
Public Schools stated in a recent meeting, it is the role of
administrators and superintendents to give their employees all of the
tools they need to be successful before considering termination.
Let me tell you about my story of a former vindictive DCPS
administrator named Dr. Margaret Labat. She was cantankerous, for lack
of a more appropriate adjective to describe her demeanor. My colleagues
and I had good reasons to detest her disrespectful attitude, and
unethical and vindictive practices which ultimately impacted our
students. In the mid-nineties, Councilwoman Kathy Patterson introduced
legislation in which DC employees could be riffed with seniority only
being considered one of many factors in a reduction in force. Of course,
I did not have a lot of experience at that time. However, what I did
have going for me was never taken into consideration by Dr. Labat, as
was required by law. Employees could earn up to a maximum of 25 points
and competed in a class of employees. Obviously employees who had the
lowest rankings were riffed. After having worked three years for Dr.
Labat, she refused to convert all of our teachers and counseling staff
from probationary status to permanent status. Her rationale was that
nobody told her what to do. Prior to being riffed, I had appealed to the
Washington Teachers’ Union to represent me in getting my permanent
status. I was the only employee on Dr. Labat’s staff to win my
permanent status after a long protracted battle. When the RIF was
announced, Dr. Labat called me into her office and said that nobody goes
to the union on her, and for doing it I you will pay. And that I did.
Labat gave me a big fat zero on my competitive ranking form. The DC
Office of Human Resources stated that it was impossible to earn zero
points; after all, you get points for years of experience, for having a
bachelors degree, for a master’s degree, for performance appraisals,
and even more points for above average ratings, all of which I had.
Needless to say, Dr. Labat refused to change my zero rating. I was
riffed the beginning of the summer.
My experience is not unique; more importantly it is germane to what
is happening today to teachers who are being placed on ninety-day
termination plans. DC teachers are not at-will employees, and can be
fired only for “just cause” by law. The newly PPEP evaluation
process created by Rhee’s administration has aborted teachers’ due
process rights. Based on one structured observation by an administrator,
without regard to other performance factors, a teacher can be placed on
a ninety-day termination plan. With only the recommendation of a
principal and an instructional superintendent, DCPS can decide to
terminate a teacher within ninety days or wait until the end of the
school year. I have posted on The Washington Teacher’s blog a story in
which a veteran teacher who had an exceeds rating for the last five
years was targeted by a new principal who wasn’t even aware of her
stellar performance. There is another story of a veteran teacher of
eighteen years who has the highest test scores in his building. He was
targeted for a ninety-day termination plan after speaking to Chancellor
Rhee about the lack of Internet accessibility in his northwest school.
It has been reported that the principal of Ron Brown threatened to place
all of his teachers on a ninety-day termination plan. The Malcolm X
principal allegedly placed six veteran teachers on a ninety-day
termination plan after the December deadline.
It isn’t just coincidence that many of the teachers who are being
targeted for ninety-day termination plans are over forty years old,
veteran teachers, and members of a minority group, although, of course,
there are younger teachers being targeted as well.
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Bad News Can Be Good News
Ed T. Barron, edtb1@macdotcom
With a tanking economy, many folks are finding themselves out of
work. Time to make lemonade. This might just be the time for many
qualified folks to switch careers. With Chancellor Rhee proposing to
dramatically raise teachers’ salaries, that proposal might just
attract the kinds of teachers needed if the public school system in the
District will survive. Data clearly show that the numbers of students in
charter schools will outnumber those in the public schools in the next
couple of years. The Teachers’ Union has opted not to vote on
Chancellor Rhee’s proposal to raise teachers’ salaries in exchange
for giving up tenure. That means it’s time to weed out the poor
teachers and replace them with those folks willing to move into a new,
high paying career with a nonunion salary scale. One of the things
Chancellor Rhee can do is to establish a fast-track certification
program for those willing to make the leap into teaching.
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Candi Peterson writes [in themail] on December 14, “There is still
a lack of helping teachers from the central office and appropriate
professional development; local school resources are wholly inadequate
and come too little, too late, or never at all.” Really? Then the
several dozen in-house professional developers hired by DCPS and
assigned to schools are there to do what, exactly? We’ve been in place
since August and are part of an extensive instructional support plan
with the goal of each school having two full-time professional
developers (one literacy and one math). We’ve had a myriad of
reactions to our presence in our schools, from open arms to verbal abuse
and everything in between. We are experienced teachers who serve as
mentors, instructional coaches, resources, data analysts, co-teachers,
facilitators, collaborators — just about any supportive role you can
think of, which varies with each teacher’s and school’s needs. So it’s
all well and good to cry that DCPS doesn’t support teachers, but my
presence, and that of my numerous colleagues, indicates Peterson’s and
Saunders’ statements are simply not true, and also that Weingarten’s
suggestion was late in the making. So, please find another excuse.
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Major Loss to the Community
Hazel Thomas, thomashazelb@aol.com
I’m sure that many of you know by now that Paul Washington passed
on Friday night. We have truly lost a giant in the Ward 5 and the larger
Washington community. We will miss his outstanding contributions to the
causes of public school education, public safely, and Democratic
politics, and also miss him in so many other ways. Our sincere prayers
are extended to his daughters and other family members. We have truly
lost the “Mayor of Ward 5.”
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Les Halles might be coming back . . . stay tuned!
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CLASSIFIEDS — EVENTS
Passport to the World New Year’s Eve Gala,
December 31
Michael Karlan, dc@prosinthecity.com
On December 31, from 9 p.m. until 2 a.m., join Professionals in the
City at its Passport to the World New Year’s Eve Gala at the Hilton
Washington in Dupont Circle. This five-hour gala includes an open bar,
sumptuous buffet, nine themed party areas each representing a different
city, live entertainment, and more. For more information or to purchase
tickets, visit http://www.newyearseveindc.com,
E-mail dc@prosinthecity.com,
or call 686-5990.
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On Wednesday, December 31, the DC Commission on the Arts and
Humanities proudly presents Arts Eve DC, an international family
experience. The Historical Society of Washington, DC, 801 K Street, NW,
will host the occasion featuring roaming talent and stations offering
activities based on New Year’s Eve customs from around the world.
Experience continuous interactive performances incorporating artistic
and cultural customs from Ethiopia, Italy, Mexico, and Korea, as well as
the United States. From 1:00 p.m.-5:00 p.m., activities include
storytelling, hands-on arts and craft activities, and engaging
family-friendly internationally themed films. The event is for the
entire family and is presented free-of-charge.
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