Father Claims The Post Fabricated His Op-Ed Piece On Teacher Ratings

Gothamschools reported today that the executive editor of the Queens Tribune is alleging the New York Post fabricated his recent op/ed about teachers' ratings. Queens Community Education Council member Brian Rafferty reportedly wrote a piece entitled "Dad: Union putting my child last," criticizing the teacher's union for blocking the city's teacher evaluations. But at a community board hearing last night, he claimed that he did not write that story, and that the Post had falsely created the impression that he was criticizing the United Federation of Teachers.

In the video (BELOW), Rafferty explains:

"I made it very clear that the position that i held is that these teacher ratings could be a very useful part of training and assisting the teachers to be better, in assisting the department of education in better serving the children of this city.."

He goes on to explain that releasing the data affixed to a teacher's name, as opposed to a given school, "would be just as harmful as it would be to release the names of poor performing students."

According to Rafferty, a writer from the New York Post called him to discuss the UFT's move to block the city from releasing teacher data. "My discussion with him [was] transcribed, turned around into an op-ed piece with my byline on it," he said. "I did not write the piece that appeared in the NY Post."

"I might be skeptical of the union sometimes," he told the crowd, "no offense guys, but there is absolutely no way that these opinions are mine."

[Via GothamSchools]