We should remind readers of the context of the Rubber Room closures:
The closures decision occurred simultaneous with the public premiere of an independent film no the rubber rooms. UFT president was letting New York City schools chancellor off the hook when he agreed to the closure of the rubber rooms. The movie was apparently embarrassing to the city.
Here, some of the best comments on the issue of rubber rooms, and accusations against teachers, by someone named "EllenB."
EllenB
6:28:20 PM
Apr 15, 2010
Having many friends who are DOE educators, I have an inside look at what's really what in the NYC education scene that many people don't have. First of all, It is absolutely APPALLING that the DN has continuously bashed teachers within its pages, particularly those assigned to the "Rubber Room". Most of those teachers have, in truth, done NOTHING wrong. They are in effect political prisoners. China or the old USSR have nothing on the Bloomberg version of the camps. Some of the teachers assigned to "Rubber Rooms", unfortunately, have in fact been incompetent or actually committed a crime. And they should, of course, be removed from the classroom. But they are a very small minority of the hundreds of teachers in "Rubber Rooms". A very small minority indeed. The teachers may have been whistleblowers on unscrupulous administrators, and their reward was to be falsely accused of hastily drawn-up charges and sent to the "Rubber Room". Students who justly received failing grades
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EllenB
6:30:01 PM
Apr 15, 2010
Cont'd for poor quality work are actively encouraged to write statements against their teachers, which are then used to "justify" charges against that teacher. And they end up in the "Rubber Room" for no authentic reason at all. Oh, and if the charges are found to be false, the teacher's name is still blackened but there are NO consequences to the students, none at all. It's such fun to get some get-back at your competent teacher who justly gave you a failing grade for low quality work or who told you to be quiet so that a lesson could proceed and people could actually learn, or who had your cell phone confiscated. Every single day since the dawn of time, teachers have had to raise their voices in class when polite requests for quiet are ignored. By rewriting definitions, this has now become a criminal offense, corporeal punishment, under Bloomberg and it's been given the title "verbal abuse". "Corporeal" refers to "bodily" and this sort of punishment originally meant tha
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EllenB
6:31:41 PM
Apr 15, 2010
CONT'D - that teachers could not physically strike students. Many teachers reassigned to "Rubber Rooms" did nothing more than speak a little too loudly. Principals with a lot of older and hence expensive teachers have been very busy inventing all sorts of ludicrous charges to then clear their school budgets of these high-priced veterans, whose salaries are then eventually taken over by the central DOE---off the budgets of the individual school. This decentralization of salary payments was instituted by Bloomberg, and presents an obvious incentive to get rid of expensive teachers--by any means. The point is, the vast majority of the teachers sitting in the "Rubber Rooms" are falsely accused by their school administration based on questionable evidence, and would much rather be TEACHING kids than sitting around. And if you, a highly educated and intelligent person, were forced to sit basically immobile in an overcrowded room, only allowed to walk around during the lunch hour, w
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EllenB
6:34:34 PM
Apr 15, 2010
CONT'D - hour, what exactly WOULD you do to pass the hours? These people are not criminals, but they are being treated so. These people are not lazy bums, but they are being characterized as such. Bloomberg created the "gotcha" parameters, then pays off the media to defame those so accused (and usually innocent), inflaming public opinion against these unjustly maligned educators and thus gaining a favorable position with which to negotiate a less favorable contract for teachers. What is so hard to see about this? Yet judging from the vicious and ignorant comments posted by many here, Bloomberg's counting on an easily roused mob mentality ("Lynch them teachers! Hang 'em high!") worked admirably.
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oneofthemany
7:37:54 PM
Apr 15, 2010
@EllenB- This is EXACTLY the truth. I dare anyone who does not work for the DOE to see what goes on these days in a school. Principals have been given carte blanche and g-d help the teacher who speaks out against him/her. They'll quickly find themselves in the rubber room on charges of corporal punishment based upon NONSENSE. Take on the thankless job of being union rep, file a grievance for a fellow colleague and you'll find yourself written up for insubordination or professional misconduct. The DOE and the Mayor cry that the Union is the reason that things move so slow but when you have 15 arbitrators for the entire city that work 5 DAYS A MONTH, whose fault is that? The 60 day rule has been in effect for years but those cases are few and far between.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/04/15/2010-04-15_city_to_close_rubber_rooms_reassignment_centers_for_teachers_accused_of_major_vi.html#ixzz0lEUy4v3w
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