Central Falls High School Will Rehire Everybody After Firing All Teachers

CENTRAL FALLS, R.I. — A school district that gained the support of President Barack Obama for promoting accountability after it fired all its teachers from a struggling school announced on Sunday it had reached an agreement with the union to return the current staffers to their jobs.

The two sides said a transformation plan for Central Falls High School for the coming school year would allow the roughly 87 teachers, guidance counselors, librarians and other staffers who were to lose their jobs at the end of this year to return without having to reapply. More than 700 people had already applied for the positions.

The agreement calls for a longer school day, more after-school tutoring and other changes.

"What this means is that they have come to an agreement about a reform effort and that will change the quality" of the education program at Central Falls, said Rhode Island Education Commissioner Deborah Gist, who applauded both sides for working together.

The board of trustees overseeing the school system in Central Falls, one of the poorest communities in the state, voted in February to fire the staff of one of the state's worst-performing schools. The school was under a mandate from the state to make improvements, and it opted for the mass firings after a breakdown in talks with teachers about other reforms that would have required more work, some without extra pay.

Obama, during a national address on education in March, said the firings were an example of the need for accountability over student performance.

"So if a school is struggling, we have to work with the principal and the teachers to find a solution," Obama said. "We've got to give them a chance to make meaningful improvements. But if a school continues to fail its students year after year after year, if it doesn't show any sign of improvement, then there's got to be a sense of accountability."

He continued: "And that's what happened in Rhode Island last week at a chronically troubled school, when just 7 percent of 11th-graders passed state math tests – 7 percent."

Details of the agreement were to be released following a ratification vote by Central Falls teachers at a meeting Monday. The union and district had been working with a mediator since March.

"Both the school district and the union agree that while this has been a difficult process for everyone involved, the negotiations resulted in a newfound appreciation for shared responsibility, and a solid commitment to bring lasting solutions that will improve teaching and learning at Central Falls High School," said a joint statement from the union and the district.

Under the deal, teachers will need to recommit to their jobs and interview with the new principal. Other changes aimed at increasing student achievement include: a new evaluation system designed to inform teaching and learning, and targeted and embedded professional development.

Central Falls Superintendent Fran Gallo said she was pleased to be welcoming the staff back. She said that among the changes would be the reassignment of the high school principal and assistant principal to the middle school.

Central Falls Teachers Union President Jane Sessums said there had always been agreement that the sides wanted what was best for the students and that significant changes were needed.

"Working together, we and the district have arrived at a solid, forward-looking agreement that provides supports for our students and the tools our teachers need to help them succeed," Sessums said.

Senior Valerie Florez, who is set to graduate next month, said rehiring the teachers was a good idea.

"It's not the teachers' fault that students don't want to learn," she said.

Florez said she used to be one of those students who didn't want to learn, skipping class and failing to do assignments, but her teachers helped her turn around.

Jonathan Beltran, a 19-year-old freshman at Roger Williams University who graduated Central Falls High School last year, had helped organize rallies and protests in support of the teachers. Beltran, who hopes one day to return to Central Falls as a math teacher, said he was happy about the agreement.

"I love the teachers at Central Falls," he said. "I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for them. I want to work side by side with them."

Antony Restrepo, who has two stepdaughters at the school, said he wanted to see improvements if all the teachers are to be rehired. But he said he wasn't sure that the problems were entirely the staff's fault.

"They just want to be in the streets," he said of some students.

___

Associated Press writer Stephen Singer in Hartford, Conn., contributed to this report.

Comments

[Righterthenthou76]

05:35 PM on 05/17/2010

This is a travesty of the highest level. These clowns deserved to be fired, as they did not perform to acceptable standards and were grossly overpaid for their incompetence. To rehire all of them now is repugnant and shows once and for all the singular problem of the American education system, teachers unions. I'm typically supportive unions, but not when it comes to teachers. As long as the teachers unions continue to run our system we will never lead the world in education. What a shame for the children of this school who will now be doomed for more years of failure. Teachers have to be held accountable for something if we are ever going to be competitive on a world stage. To those who point to all the factors outside of a teachers control, I would simply ask; then why are we paying you $70,000+ to "work" for only nine months and not make any noticeable difference? Teachers must hold themselves to a higher standard. What a sorry and pathetic example it sends to the kids in schools around the country. You can fail on the highest level, rightly get fired, but if you complain enough and have a powerful enough union, you can be rehired, despite your incompetence. And people wounder why China, India and elsewhere are gaining on our students every day. It's because they have teachers who work had to make their system better rather then sitting around complaining about being fired for doing nothing.

[Gasparilla]

06:47 PM on 05/17/2010

That's easy to say. You have some teachers who teach at suburban high schools with students who are much easier to teach and more willing to be subject to discipline. You put these other teachers in schools with the poorest of the poor and expect miracles.

[Righterthenthou76]

12:25 AM on 05/18/2010

A few things; 1. The school in question was abysmal even by urban/inner city standards. It's pretty bad when you can't even match the rest of the bottom of the barrel 2. Once again, while I understand that there are always factors beyond a teachers control, the excuses don't move our system forward. While people and the unions sit around like the BP executives trying to deflect blame, we have a worsening and massive leak in our system. It's clear in a lot of schools that the current staffs, for whatever reason, although incompetence is often the culprit, that they are incapable of stopping the leak. Therefore school systems should be applauded for not willing to blindly accept failure, and look for people who can do a better job. However today they are in fact vilified for doing their job and making a sound "business" decision, based on years of poor performance. The problem we have as a nation is that we refuse to treat K-12 education as a business. If College professors (outside of some right wing creationism colleges) had the same track record, they would have been let go yesterday. In order for our system to thrive there must be competition and yes, even fear. Without it there is little incentive for teachers to teach under difficult circumstances, which by the way is when they need to be the most willing to go the extra mile, not the least.

[Gasparilla]

03:49 PM on 05/17/2010

A lot of these kids, backed up by their parents, have a hostility to any kind of authority and see any other student trying to get ahead as a suckup. Sorry, it's the truth.

[gino618]

03:15 PM on 05/17/2010

These teachers' salaries averaged $70,000 in a town where the average salary is about $22,000. They were asked to add 25 minutes to their school days... and provide tutoring.

They refused. So, they were fired.

To make that kind of money - nearly 3 times the average of the area they teach in - and not be willing to make those kind of concessions to help educate the children was outrageous. They deserved what they got.

Kudos to the school administration for having the guts to stand up to the teacher's union and stand FOR the kids.

[AudiGuy]

09:39 PM on 05/17/2010

Wrong wrong wrong..... The teachers were never given the opportunity to vote in the first round plus they HAD a RECENTLY SIGNED CONTRACT. The national teachers union refused the vote.

"Kudos to the school administration for having the guts to stand up to the teacher's union" Wrong again. The administration went back to the table because they knew they would not win the law suit for violating a SIGNED CONTRACT. Also note, the teachers will be paid an addional $3,000 for the extra time and no one is out of a job. So who won?

[Righterthenthou76]

12:43 AM on 05/18/2010

Sounds to me like it was buyers remorse on the part of the administration. My question is why did it take them 20 years and another singed contract to wake up and fire everyone? The only reason I bring up the 20 years is that one of the fired teachers had the gall to say "I feel like, after 20 years, I can see some progress beginning to be made. And I'm sad that we're not going to be around to follow that through, to push that forward." The teachers and other staff have to on some basic level understand that they were/are not reaching their students, for whatever reason. They should have done the honorable thing and looked for other sources of employment, rather then dooming another round of students to failure and flipping burgers, while they collect their $70,000 for nine months work. I'm sorry, they did finally agree to more after school tutoring, and we all know they will put forth their max effort for that.

[Jay in Austin]

02:14 PM on 05/17/2010

Lessee . . . blaming the "students, etc." INSTEAD of all the LOUSY, INCOMPETENT teachers and administrators? Oh, yeah, right. Girls who wear short skirts are really at fault for getting raped. And people who manufacture guns and bullets are really the folks to blame for crime. Up is really down. White is really black. And people who believe and promote such nonsensical ideas should be hailed as heroes instead of ignorant, uniformed, emotional mob-members. Bring on the pitchforks, buckets of tar, and feathers! Down with REAL education! Sigh . . . .

[changing]

01:17 PM on 05/17/2010

As an long time educator, I am relieved that the Rhode Island teachers were rehired. How terrible to spend your whole career in education and be fired in mass to satisfy political whims. The Obama administration could not be more wrong in their elitist, business model for education. Don't believe Obama or his kids ever went to any public school in their lives. Arnie Duncan never taught a day in his life. So stop this insanity. Get rid of Arnie Duncan and the Wheel of Fortune Race to the Top. Use the data accountability funds for real needs of the schools-books, tutoring, and social programs to help the communities.l

[Righterthenthou76]

01:00 AM on 05/18/2010

The school system did what they felt was the correct action, and well within their rights. The President and secretary of Education endorsed it after the fact. I simply reject that the school system was pressured in any way by the Obama administration. This has nothing to do with "political whims." And a business model is exactly what the system needs. As you are an educator, I'd like to know, where is the competition for teachers to excel? Because not every teacher has the right drive and will to teach and reach students when the circumstances are difficult. The system is set up with reverse incentives as of right now, the "good" teachers will rise to the top of the economic ladder, aka the suburbs, while the inner city is all too often left holding the bag with poor teachers who are overpaid and don't want to work hard to improve things for their "challenged" students. If more teachers had to start off working in under performing schools and had the fear of being fired before being able to move up the ladder, I guarantee, you'd see better results and harder working inner city teachers. But I'm sure this is at odds with the unions, who want to get paid their $70,000 for nine months and no overtime, and then maybe worry about student performance as an afterthought form a moment or two while on their summer hiatus. American students deserve much better.

[Righterthenthou76]

01:06 AM on 05/18/2010

Also, what would you propose as way for the TEACHERS, not anything outside of them, to improve performance at the school in question? Or is the whole thing the result of outside forces? At which point, I would ask, why not have robots teach the students? I've noticed a lot of anger and finger pointing at everyone but the teachers. So what would you hold the teachers personalty accountable for? Anything?

[blindhog]

01:06 PM on 05/17/2010

Yeah, and how STUPID it was to fire them!!!!!

WHERE WAS ARNIE DUNCAN (aka, the dunce) when all this stupidity was going on?

Why wasn't he correcting the spending alotments to the various schools? Why wasn't he pushing for no illegal non English speaking children in the schools? Why wasn't he addressing oversized classes and classes that have children that vary in achievement by as much as 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 grades?

WHERE WAS ARNIE DUNCAN??????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[iblogleft]

12:54 PM on 05/17/2010

I believe many of you are really complaining about bloated hierarchies, not bloated teaching salaries.

Unions should not have wage bargaining powers under penalty of strike if they are employed by the pubic. It is an impossible to give more to people if the society surrounding them is unable to afford it. The truth is, like so many things in this country, schools have a bloated hierarchy, bad priorities, and a history of poor management.

We could save billions by simply building schools with 5 or 6 templates that make all schools exactly the same, with different faces to make them unique. When all the infrastructure is the same (or mostly the same) we can build and maintain schools for a fraction of what we spend now. Schools need to be flexible to student population, making the needs for modular designs paramount.

We could compile services and oversight into a few governing bodies that would cut massive spending on management bureaucracy.

Just these changes could make the lives of teachers and children much better off, and allow us not only to pay and train teachers better, but cut costs as well.

As for those of you that wish to capitalize our public schools, look around you. What we have now is the result of that pursuit. Creating a system that profits on the education of our students will invite yet another education disaster. This is an issue where the failure of one extreme does not invite the failure of another.

[mw21]

01:12 PM on 05/17/2010

You seem to argue against yourself. Standardize education, give it a few governing bodies and save money. Then you argue against bloated hierarchies and capitalizing schools. Then you ask for more flexibility. In practice, these are contradictory. For instance, I am an administrator at a K-12 school with 170 students, in a very small town in the mountains. Most Ed Reform efforts are aimed at the big urban and suburban schools and have absolutely no application to my school. We have solid test scores, graduate literally everyone and most go on to higher ed. The vast majority of schools district in my state are small--under 1000--for the entire district. Local communities need to be the driving force behind what our schools will be like. Not the state and definitely not the feds. Every small school administrator I know will agree with this.

[iblogleft]

03:30 PM on 05/17/2010

Local school systems making teaching policy is one of the most dangerous, and historically destructive practices in our history.

[ParisBeret45]

12:33 PM on 05/17/2010

I agree with those those former students who've voiciferously stated that the failure of these schools to perform DOES NOT rest solely with the instructors.

However, they seem to spend so much of their time sticking up for the teachers that they can't seem to some up with solutions to the poor student motivation and lack of parental involvement that most certainly contributes to the horrible rate of success at this high school. Have they absolutely NO sway over the attitudes of those in their community who don't see the value of a good education?

It isn't sufficient to say that poor school performance isn't all on the teachers. Why don't these supportive young people hold accountable ALL those involved directly and indirectly with a student's education be they parents, teachers, community leaders, employers, clergymen, friends, neighbors or the students themselves?

The time spent organizing in support of the instructors might best be spent in helping to create a community wide culture that understands the value of education.

[Just walkin the dog here]

11:47 AM on 05/17/2010

Stated simply, it's not the teachers. Parents have to own the fact that most of their kids go to school unprepared. And I am not a teacher, but did parent the same way mine did. "Got your homework done yet?, Let me look at it"

[joefoss]

11:45 AM on 05/17/2010

"Teachers Re-hired?"
=I feel so badly for President Obama and Secretary of Education Duncan. They must be so disappointed!
=Perhaps, next time, they should try a new strategy:
fire all the teachers and replace them with undocumented immigrants. Those folks may not speak much English, but they work for next to nothing. And, if they make trouble (like trying to join a union), we can have them deported!
=What do you think? Barry? Arne?

[miamorphos]

11:56 AM on 05/17/2010

I think that this post exemplifies the lack of intelligence in American popular culture that has brought us to this low point of education. Schools do not exist in a vacuum, and if this is the kind of thinking that surrounds young people as they try to learn, what kind of an example is that? Are you okay, sir?

[Riverman]

12:18 PM on 05/17/2010

That would be one way to look at it

[Bepragmatic]

11:44 AM on 05/17/2010

There needs to be a new definition of what "Educational System" means. This definition needs to take in to account all the major influences on a child's education. You start with pre-natal care, working with parents before the children are of school age, develop a sense of community where we all feel a stake in the progress of our students and schools. There is so much more, but as long as our "Educational System" is so short sighted to include only our teachers and schools we will fail. I had hopes, but am disappointed that our president has such a narrow view.

[Righterthenthou76]

01:14 AM on 05/18/2010

How would you fix schools that don't reach standards, and what responsibility would you assign to individual teachers, if any? I'm all for fixing the outside factors, but in the end, teachers are hired to teach up to cretin standards, when these standards are not met, we have a problem. When/how should it be determined when it's a failure of the teachers or some outside factors? And if teachers at a school show over a prolonged period of time that they don't meet the set standards, then what? Should they be allowed to continue to fall short because of unsolved outside factors, or should they finally be held to account for their continued failings?

[Bepragmatic]

11:56 AM on 05/18/2010

Why is it that the schools that aren't meeting standards are made up of students from low socioeconomic backgrounds and where students are learning English as their second language. To hold teachers accountable, you have to have realistic standards that take into account the makeup of the students. No one size fits all.

[desertdweller]

11:22 AM on 05/17/2010

As a former secondary school science teacher, I can attest to the fact that teachers in many schools get very little support, or sympathy, from the front office and are in many cases, overwhelmed by non-teaching duties. Speaking for myself, I was often up until midnight grading papers, exams, etc., and creating lesson plans because during my so-called "free periods" I was patrolling the parking lot. I often had to pay for supplies out my own pocket and this is true for the majority of public school teachers and evidence of their dedication.

[Righterthenthou76]

01:16 AM on 05/18/2010

I applaud your commitment to teaching your students, however I doubt that the teachers at the school in question shared your work ethic and commitment, in spite of hard circumstances

[oxygen]

11:03 AM on 05/17/2010

are there any teachers brave enough since this became national news - to let us monitor and hold them accountable for their long work days, weeks and summers? please, come on, someone let us see you in action, let us hold you accountable! showering for work, travel time, summer vacation whereby you claim you need respite does not count towards a calculation of "work"! show me, teach me about your long hard days of underpaid civil service

[blueken]

11:02 AM on 05/17/2010

The firing of the teachers certainly got their attention. The bigger issue is, do we want higher taxs or fewer services. The American people want secure borders, safe products, fire protection, good education, care for the elderly and a civil and lawfull community. All this costs money. Make some hard choices, but keep in mind your children may pay the price. According to Time Mag the average American paid 5% of their income for federal tax in 2009, the lowest since 1950. Time to man up and pay some bills people.

[gino618]

03:20 PM on 05/17/2010

Ask any working person here if they had only 5% of their pay taken out in taxes....

Those numbers are 'arranged' nicely to provide exactly the talking point you use. It doesn't take into account that numerous people were unemployed, or that nearly 1/2 the country doesn't pay income taxes (leaving the bulk for the rest of us who do).

How about having those bottom 45-50% who don't pay.... start paying something.... let them contribute something to the bills the rest of us are already footing.

[blueken]

04:22 PM on 05/17/2010

Sorry, 5% was a typo, the figure is 9%. Of course that's just federal income tax. It doesn't account for FICA, state sales tax, property tax etc.....By the way, I have worked for the last 41 years and I own property. My point is, more taxes or less service. Choose one.

[roudy]

10:46 AM on 05/17/2010

As with most of these situations, it is not the school and teachers failing the students. It is the community, the parents, and the students themselves failing to have even minimal involvement with the school and the teachers.

President Obama is wrong on this, he took an easy cheap shot which has nothing to do with the reallity of the situation. He is simply once again pandering to the right wing extremists who hate him and everything about him and his administration.

[blueken]

11:03 AM on 05/17/2010

I agree, parents send children to school un-prepared to learn and communities don't give schools sufficent funds, then blame the teachers.