“Places, Everyone!”- in Which the Former ATR Plays the Role of Obedient Minion. Or Not. And All the UFT Reps are Going By the Same Script.

The Teacher Under Assault's story tells us a UFT that is merely a service organization, not an advocacy organization. It shouldn't have to be this way.

So, where were we? Oh, yes, we were at the part of the story where the principal tells me that the students at the Middle School where I was subjected to constant racial taunts and epithets “Don’t know [I’m] white”. OK. I guess looking at me (I am one of those people who burns in 15 minutes with SPF 512) didn’t give them a clue. Riiiiiiight. 

And where IS the UFT in all this? The fearless defenders of teachers’ rights has been hard at work…..

Wait, give me a minute to check my files….

Hold on, maybe it was an email…. Nope, not there either….

Ah, here we go! Nope, that was the result of yet another MRI showing ANOTHER back injury as a result of this latest bias assault….

Let’s see, it’s gotta be here somewhere. UFT, UFT, hmmm…..

Well, I guess they haven’t done all that much after all.

OK, maybe that’s a little harsh. Allow me to give a synopsis of what HAS been done to date. I have met with my district rep, borough rep, and my Victims’ Support person at my borough UFT office TWICE. Both times, my statement that the indifference to the students’ attacks and race baiting, coupled with the principal’s “they don’t know you’re white” comment are discriminatory and evidence of racial bias, led to a VERY quick changing of the subject and a reprimand to “stick to the facts of the case – that you were injured in the line of duty. We are not here to discuss the other issues.”

I insisted that under no uncertain terms do I have the intention of returning to teach in a building where the students are permitted to commit bias crimes while the principal empowers them by pretending they do not exist. I said that I need to know what can be done and who can be contacted to ensure that I do not return to this situation where I feel retaliation would be the order of the day from the minute I entered the building. I was given more paperwork to complete (they are great at giving me more homework to do whenever I squawk), and left with assurances from my borough rep that they were “working hard behind the scenes to get this resolved, but we really have no power. It’s up to the network and your network is based in another borough, not this one, which means we really have no clout in this matter.”

Um, really? There are only FIVE borough reps in the whole city. They all answer directly to Mulgrew. Did my borough rep mean to tell me that these five reps don’t know each other and never speak? That they can’t call each other and say, “Hey, it’s me from the borough next door, I need a favor”? They can’t get Mulgrew to sit with them or make a phone call to hash this out? I am sure the head of the police or firefighters’ unions would be more than happy to work on behalf of a member who was being beaten (literally) on the job. Or is it that NO ONE wants to talk about the fact that whites can be the subject of bias crimes and that teachers being beaten and abused by the very students for whom they are held “accountable”? Any mention of the fact that if I were a black teacher being taunted, called the “N” word and beaten by white students, I would have been pulled from the school and the principal reprimanded within a week led to an abrupt end to the meeting, with assurances that they were “working on it”.

Since then, everyone at the UFT has been following the same script.

I received a call about a week later from a UFT social worker. She wanted to know how I was doing after me recent diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome and the finding of yet ANOTHER back injury (on top of the ones that came from the first time I was plowed down in the classroom). So I laid out the basics and once again, insisting that what happened to me should be treated as a series of BIAS INCIDENTS, and that since the student said she could “do whatever [she] want to this damn white bitch” right before she pushed me down, the attack should be treated as a HATE CRIME. Immediately, her response was, “we are not here to discuss that right now. I just am calling to check up on you and see how you are as a result of this latest line of duty. Those other things are not part of the conversation right now”. If this sounds familiar, it’s because I heard the same line from my Borough and District Reps and Victims’ Support Advocate in my last meeting.

At my first Medical Bureau exam, I was met by a UFT rep to guide me through the process and witness my medical exam. Since we had a lot of time to kill while waiting, I began to share my story with her and share with her the emails and reports pertaining to my situation. I once again made the observation that, if I were a black teacher being treated this way by a white administrator and white students, I would have been pulled from the situation within a week. Her response? “We are not here to discuss that right now. At this point, we are only here to have your injuries assessed and make sure the Line of Duty is approved so you keep getting paid. These other issues have nothing to do with it.” Wow, that sounded familiar!

Recently, I had my second medical exam, and this time, the social worker who originally called me from Victims’ Support accompanied me to the Medical Bureau. Once again, given that we had much time to kill, I began to share with her some of the emails and reports I had compiled which showed the race baiting and bias incidents I was subjected to, and the lack of response or sensitivity on the part of administration. She wouldn’t ever read anything I shared with her, handing it back immediately and saying, “We are not here to discuss this right now. The important thing is making sure that your LODI request is properly submitted and approved so you can get the treatment you need.”

She, too, has been assimilated.

So it appears that everyone here has an assigned role – My district rep makes the occasional phone call to assure me that they are “working on it”. The Victims’ Support advocate answers the occasional email and gives me more paper to fill out when I get noisy. And the social worker holds my hand through the process and assures me that the Victims’ Support people are “very good at what they do” and that these racial issues are “irrelevant”.

And I guess my role is to be obedient, do as they say and realize that race is irrelevant here.

But what if I don’t?

Our force-located ATR's sojourn takes a dangerous turn

 Our force-located ATR from November 23rd gives an update on her dangerous sojourn. The details involve hospitalization from an assault by a student.
(Since this post went up the teacher is out of the school.)

From December 17:
Today, on December 17, 2013, I arrived to school 2.5 hours late (interesting number, because I started work at the school 2.5 months after the start of school in September). A blind gentleman and his seeing eye dog fell onto the tracks at 125th Street on the A,B and C line in Harlem. The delay of my train made me so late for work that I missed my first class, my second class, my prep, and 10 or so minutes of my 4th period class.
When I entered my classroom, there was an ATR covering my class. The kids were upset with me because they claim that I failed them. According to my directives from the principal and AP, my job was to enter grades on skedula.com and make sure to input all work received. So, I did that. Skedula then calculates their grades. How hard can that be to understand? Well, the kids are of the "get over mentality". The kids say, "if we're in class everyday, doing your work, why don't we pass"? I told them that the marking period started prior to my getting the job, but all of their work from Oct. 21 - Dec. 6 counted. The other kids who did the work received credit, and those who did not do the work, got a zero for every assignment missed. 60% of the grade is classwork. They were in class, some anyway, many not, and did not do their classwork.

I told them two weeks ahead of the end of the cycle that I would be collecting notebooks to see what they had done while I was not their teacher. Few had done the work, many had a name on the page or handout and little else. Some had aims and do-nows, but no work. Some had name, aim, do now, and 1 vocabulary word out of 5 and the 3 questions were missing. To me that would be a 0 or a 55 or something between those 2 grades.

So, the kids were all cussing up a storm. They were upset with me, the "bitch" who "fuckin' failed me". I told them that if they wanted to know how their grades were calculated, that I would talk to them after class. 

They said "no, tell us now." So, I did what they wanted and I had their graded work, and a list of other work that they had done on a sheet of paper. So, I gave back the work, and stopped along each table to talk to the student. I told each student, this is what you gave me, and I gave them their work back, and then I showed them my sheet of work they had shown me. 

I then told them that there were 32 assignments consisting of Classwork, Exams, Participation, and HW. I gave them ample opportunity to find the work, to do the work when I was out with bronchitis, to get on an online website and do HW assignments that I set up. Every opportunity that was given, I gave them.

So, as I went from kid to kid, one kid called me a bitch for failing a "good student", someone he thought was a good student. Then, other trouble makers let me know what they thought of "my" failing their friends. So, I had gone around. 

Then, this one kid, continues to say "fuck you...on and on...then, when I went closer to him, I asked him to stop, "your behavior is not appropriate and I will submit a referral"..So, he continued with that same phrase over and over, then, out of no where, he says "I can kill you, I can stab you, I can shoot you"! I thought that he was out of his mind. So, I wrote this down on my pad. And as I was going to move back to my desk, he slaps my left hand hard, and knocks my anecdotal book to the floor. 

I go to pick it up, and he had, in his hand, a plastic bottle that he had been squeezing flatter and flatter. He had it clenched in his hand. And before I made it back up with the pad, the boy punches me in the back of my head, with the bottle in his hand. I felt and heard the sound of the punch and the bottle as it hit me in the head. I was in shock!

I had the pad in my hand, I got my cellphone, ran across the hall to the "dean's office" (dean was arrested last week when a kid accosted him and he tried to defend himself. The videotape shows the dean hitting the kid. But when the kid was beating the dean up in the classroom, there was no videotape. And everyone in the building acts like it never happened. The dean is no longer an employee of the NYC DOE. He is a 17 year vet, married, with 5 kids and a mortgage.)

The woman across the hall who works in the dean's office, asked me to identify the kid. When I went with her back to my room, while dialing 911, I pointed to him. The 911 dispatcher asked me what happened and I told her that I needed the police because of what this kid had done...I'm still on the phone with 911 and the boy I identified to the woman, gets up suddenly. Within 1 second, he flips my 60 pound desk upside down, took all of my stuff and shattered and destroyed all of my things. Debris was flying everywhere. It was chaos. He took the white board and rammed it into the wall, and he kept going. I had already given the info to the dispatcher, somehow got my coat and backpack, and was running to the principal's office for safety.

The kid was arrested, thrown in jail. I was taken by ambulance to the hospital. I was in the emergency room for 7 hours. I was given a CT Scan after being there for 5 hours. The results came back after another 1.5 hours. Then, I was released with a mild concussion. I got a note from the doc. I'm out until January. I will no longer work at that school. It should be shutdown, period! There is no reason why a failing school should be allowed to operate. If the kids are not going to school, and may come in high on weed, or drunk, or are violent, or have no school supplies, then maybe this idea of keeping it open is not a good one. Shut it down,now!

I must tell you that I have one more problem. I am now a victim 7 times over. I have been assaulted and/or threatened with violence 7 times over the last two years and 2.5 months. I forget to eat, I'm nervous going into the school. I fear the students. Seriously! I am so stressed out that I can't do things the way I used to. My poor 8 year old has a mom who looks unhappy most of the time. I am so stressed out I have to chant mantras to myself everyday, almost every class, in hopes that my day won't be ruined by some emotionally disturbed kids, or some of my kids may not have taken their meds, or a kid does something outrageous. 

Everyday I walk in, I walk in ready to teach, ready to have a good day. But then, reality strikes me when I enter the school's front doors, and run up those stairs, that attack my back and knees as I ascend them. I see the unclean place that I call work, and the faces of my students cutting classes, and the ignorance and anger mix together and my heart starts to race and I want to turn around and run out the door, but I can't. I have to work. I don't have the luxury of not working.

To top that all off, the administration seems to think that they hired me in September. I have not read enough UDL, Danielson, CCSS, learned to read IEPs, lesson plans the way the principal "encourages" us to write them (in fact, I have not found ONE person who even writes lesson plans in CCSS, BRIA fashion at all!!), I cannot meet the incredible high standards that they have laid out for me. I was never even given an IPC (Initial Planning Conference to sign off on how I would like to be evaluated, and all the things the principal would like to see..ad nauseam).

It all boils down to this...Teaching was my career. It has been ruined by, not a few students or administrators, but by many. I didn't sign on to be humiliated, abused, victimized, and depressed. No, no, I did not. Not. Not. Not.

My dream as an educator was to teach and to learn and to inspire and to excite and to help students envision a life where they too can teach, whether in a classroom, or a boardroom, or anywhere else. It has always been my dream to create wonderful students who will go out and lead our country into a future that allows everyone to thrive.

Before another teacher walks into another classroom, I suggest we picket the Mayor's Office and get legislation that puts thugs like the one who walloped me today into a closed school setting, where kids can be monitored, behaviors and bad attitudes can be modified to help the child live more happily and lovingly, those who need meds or therapy can get it right there on campus. We have got to come to our senses. By allowing students to harm the very leaders, we as educators are, is tantamount to having an Anarchistic Government. No rules! No consequences! No Values! No Morals! No Respect! Everything goes to hell!

From January 1:

I was assaulted at Bread and Roses high school on December 17, 2013, when a student with a plastic bottle in his hand, punched me in the back of the head. He then went on to ransack my classroom.

I was sent to the emergency room, and he was sent to jail. While the physical pain and injuries healed, the emotional trauma has not.

At this school, last year, three teachers were assaulted. Now, from December 3 -18, 2013, three teachers were assaulted. The dean was assaulted on December 3rd, I was assaulted on December 17, and yet another teacher has been assaulted on the 18th.

Six assaults in two school years. Six teachers hurt. How many of us need to be assaulted before an investigation is done on the school and the principal, Dr. Rodney Lofton?

I have called and sent emails to all of my representatives: Letiticia James, NYC Public Advocate; Jumanne Williams, City Council member from Brooklyn, where I reside, and Eric Adams, Brooklyn Borough President.

I gave them all of the phone numbers to the principal, Amy Arundell and Felicia Eugene.

I'm outraged that they would either by acting or failing to act, put me back in a school where I was assaulted, and a total of 6 teachers, including myself were assaulted.

I hope that I am moved before I step foot in that very violent school.

Unsafe! Unsafe! Unsafe!

“They Don’t Know You’re White” – In Which the Former ATR is Told That Being Called a “White Bitch” is NOT Racist

Life in Limbo returns as Teaching under Assault, the attacked teacher from an usafe Queens middle school provides another installment. As you'll recall, she had little support from the DOE or the UFT after injury-causing incidents.

Let’s backtrack a bit, to the day before my second trip to the ER at the hands of my middle school students.  The day was going like any other typical day here at MS Anarchy and Mayhem.  In other words, kids were coming into the classrooms at random to high-five and fist bump friends, responding with “Shut the fuck up bitch”, “It’s ‘cause I’m black, right?” or “Calm your white titties” when the fact that there was a CLASS going on was brought to their attention.  Shoes were thrown across the room. Students helped themselves to things on my desk.  Hand and body lotion was applied and perfume sprayed during the “Do Now”.  Students walked in and out of the room to see friends in the hallway, and opened the doors for intruders to enter and perform obscene dances.  Rap beats were drummed using desks and pens, while other students rapped obscene lyrics about me and about each other.  I heard the sound of tables and chairs being overturned in the classroom next door twice, along with more rapping to the beats as the teacher next door tried to get the class to quiet down.  I encountered running groups of students in the hallway as I walked to the ladies’ room.  

It was in this oasis of tranquility that I sat down to check my email on my VERY OWN classroom computer! (Pardon the capitals, but I haven’t had an actual COMPUTER in my room in SEVEN years, so I am just giddy over it. No printer, but hey, these things take time, right? And even if I had a printer, it would run out of toner by Thanksgiving anyway, but I digress). 

So there was an email summoning me to the principal’s office. Given that I had recently been reporting the violent and threatening incidents happening around me, I wrote back that I would like to have my District Rep, who had been in the building with me earlier in the day, present and could we fine a mutually convenient time. My principal responded that I must come that afternoon and that “union representation is not necessary, as we will be discussing instruction”.  Not wishing to be insubordinate, I went.  

When I went to the meeting, I was first reprimanded for not notifying my principal of the issues and asked why I did not.  I responded that everything was documented with the deans and the APs who are responsible for the classes involved.  I also said that I was surprised that none of the deans or APs, with whom I communicate with daily, saw fit to mention this situation in school safety meetings or as a matter of course. We agreed that I will include the principal in all correspondence of this nature from now on.

Then the conversation turned to "instruction" - sort of.  The principal said that she had to wonder how students "have the TIME to even get into this kind of trouble. There must me some kind of issue with your planning because the students seem to have a LOT of time on their hands and that must be what is causing the problems.”  I responded that there is ALWAYS work ready for them to do and that I plan for a full period of instruction, however, when the students enter the room, overturning chairs, fighting, and screaming, and then refuse to leave the room, line up outside, and enter properly, well, it's hard to get things going.  She responded, "Maybe you have WORK, but is it ENGAGING? Are you differentiating? Do they LIKE the work you give them?  It sounds like they just don't like the work you are providing and are acting out because of that. I think we need to work on your ability to engage students and on your classroom management.  It sounds like you have problems establishing routines and norms in your classroom.”

On the issues of the bias incidents that I was subjected to, she said, '”You know, I have to say that I don't think our students are astute enough to pick up on that issue. I doubt they even know you are white.  I think they just see that calling you 'white bitch' or 'white this-and-that' upsets you, and THAT's why they say it, not because they understand what it means.”  She said that "If they see that it doesn't bother you when they call you these names, then it would have stopped, but the fact that it bothers you and gets you upset and running to the deans and THAT's why they keep saying it. It all comes down to engagement and RELATING to the young people, and this seems to be what is causing your problems."

So, now this is all MY FAULT?  I brought this on myself because I am not "ENGAGING"???? REALLY???  And the kids can call me "white bitch" and tell me to "move my white ass" or that I "smell white", but they don't know I'm white and don't mean anything by it? REALLY????  I maintain that if the racial makeup was reversed, she wouldn't DARE say these things, nor belittle them to this extent. I feel as if I have been violated again - a classic "blame the victim" argument that is completely FALSE.  I am the VICTIM here --the VICTIM of bias crimes and ASSAULTS and I get told about MANAGEMENT?

The meeting ended with a promise to come into my classes the next day and discuss “appropriate behavior with the young people”.  She showed up once, for the ONE Honors class I teach which gives NO trouble at all, and prattled on about how she has “high expectations for everyone and that no one should allow themselves to be distracted by the behavior of others”.  Later that day, I left in an ambulance.

Hey, thanks for the help.

Teacher is attacked on duty. The DOE and the UFT do little to help

An ATR returns to the classroom, and she is attacked by students in this middle school. The DOE blames the victim and the UFT gives minimal assistance. This is just the beginning of the story.

During the '11-'12 school year, I was assigned an ICT class with a significant number of students with behavioral problems. The students quickly realized that the response to their antics was anemic at best, with generally no consequences. I had begun making the administration aware that the behavior of the students was getting more and more dangerous as the lack of consequences was causing them to push the envelope, as 8th graders will. This culminated in a fight breaking out in my classroom, and two BIG 8th grade boys, running at full speed in the classroom, plowed into me, knocking me into the desks, chairs and the crate of books I was moving at the time. I was out on Line of Duty for seven months, during which I had surgery to repair my knee and four rounds of epidural steroid injections to ease pain from six herniated discs in my back and neck. I was SHOCKED when I was sent back to the same school, but went back with modifications and was given the Wilson reading program to teach for the '12-'13 school year.

This year, I was assigned full classes (though I have nothing in writing from my doctors lifting my accommodations and I am still being treated for injuries incurred as a result of the fall). I have two ICT classes that I see with NO second teacher, and the discipline in the building is virtually nonexistent, or too little to really make an impact on a school culture of complete disrespect and anarchy. The entire seventh grade has essentially declared war on me – I am subjected to continual race baiting, called “white bitch”, threatened with being beaten and/or shot on a daily basis. Students fight, threaten, use table legs as weapons, throw rocks, candy, and pens at me while I work with students, etc. I have been documenting and reporting these incidents DAILY to both my school administration and the UFT, with little to no response. I was terrified of being hurt again, and made this clear. My worst expectations were realized yesterday, when a student who had just been returned to my class after a Student Removal (she had sprayed perfume in my face), began a long racist diatribe about how she can do whatever she wants “to this damn white bitch and the school can’t do SHIT because it’s just a school. It ain’t no police or anything it’s a damn school and I am a child so I can do whatever the fuck I want to the white bitch. I’ve about had it with this bitch – she need her white ass kicked”. She then pushed between me and a table, used her body to shove me out of the way and knocked me to the floor. I was taken out of the building in an ambulance for the second time, and the injuries to my back are now aggravated and I am once again home in pain.

The union, outside of a brief call to tell me to make sure I fill out all the required forms, has said nothing, in spite of the fact that I had been up to the borough office TWICE in two weeks to tell them that I feel unsafe and fear for my health in the building. I am still waiting to see if they dare send me back to this school.