The biggest lie has always been to keep quiet; and the best life-enhancer is to provoke, unsettle, rile – in short, to make people face the truth.
Gore Vidal
I have requested public information from the Sarasota County Schools.Please have your secretary keep tabs on the fulfillment of my request.
Dr. Hamilton lists Sarasota as a client on a previous list recorded on his lobbying Web site.Now he is consultant for the Mixon firm, which mysteriously received your lobbying contract.I suspect razzle-dazzle manipulation to keep Dr. Hamilton as Sarasota's lobbyist via a sham consulting perch at Mixon.
I don't know how you can afford a lobbyist in this economic downturn. Did you do a needs study before hiring a lobbyist?Did your superintendent mayhap slip one past the board without its registering on the board's radar? This appointment may have been the fruit of a male-bonding stint of your superintendent and Dr. Hamilton at Joe's Bar and Grill, where many similar macho deals are sealed with a martini--or several. Ditto for the Mayberry Machiavelli to Mixon. The problem with these maneuvers is that each one requires equal-opportunity ads to prove that Sarasota does honor its pledge to be an equal-employment-opportunity employer. And the board is responsible for that pledge, not the superintendent if he did not honor it.
Dr. Hamilton is a disagreeable, rumpled, grumpy man who loved to brag at HCSB that he was a "bastard" to work for and who was Superintendent Dr. Earl Lennard's henchman in attempting to crucify Doug Erwin, a school administrator who discovered shoddy, leaking school buildings that got top dollar for contractors stamped by the board, rigged bids, and outright theft. Google Doug Erwin to read the story of a school board terminally derelict in duty and with some probably on the take.
Mr. Erwin finally filed a whistle blower suit against the board, won it, and escaped to Georgia retirement with his pension intact and his settlement of $165,000 for the crucifixion by the administration and collusive board. The taxpayers footed the bill for administration and board crime. The board fired not a single person afterwards. It should have begun with the superintendent.
When Mr. Erwin had tried to get the board and administration to do something about the crime he uncovered, they instead mounted a campaign to prove him crazy. It was the old chestnut, "Oh, don't listen to Doug Erwin. Everybody knows he's crazy." Those that did not partake in the crucifixion of Mr. Erwin were out in the streets without a job.
Dr. Lennard and his goons along with a complicit board had tried to fire Mr. Erwin and remove his pension. This behavior suggests to me that people in high administrative slots were benefiting from the in-school crime that Mr. Erwin tried to expose--including the board as well since it was rubber-stamping the leaking school buildings for contractor top-dollar reimbursement. You now see contractors of all stripes listed in incumbents' donor lists online in the Supervisor of Election's records when they run again for office today. That smells.
The people who govern HC schools are not nice people, not ethical public servants, so Hamilton was in his element. This "gentleman" has not mastered grammar and punctuation (doesn't know the difference between "your" and "you're) yet has made his money in education and now tries by hook or crook to double-dip his pension and a lobbyist take from taxpayers when he is still marginally literate and still not up to the mark ethically to represent children in the schools, especially my grandchildren, to the legislature.
I wrote the president of UF, Dr. Machen--and his wife, too, cautioning about letting slack thesis committees turn loose on the world UFPhDs who probably bought and paid for their theses. These reluctant scholars head straight to the K12 administrative racket: that's where the money is in bloated salaries and perquisites, in irregular contracts to buddies, and in--I am sorry to say it--under-the-table deals from the firms the schools do business with.
I wonder what these creatures do with their tax-kitty purloined money. They will never buy a master painting or read a good book. And these cultural barbarians can wear only a limited number of vulgar gold jewelry with giant zirconias and go to Hawaii for pricey vacations with non-stop room service only so many times before even they get bored.
While in HillsboroughCounty, Dr. Hamilton indulged himself in a there's-no-fool-like-an-old-fool caper that involved promoting a pet kindergarten teacher, Connie Mileto, past qualified people for the post of government liaison in Tallahassee. She's there now. I observed La Mileto at an HC political meeting. Her idea of good public relations with legislators is to giggle loudly, squeal with delight in thin air, and hop up to lock her arms around a trapped Solon's neck while his eyes tick-tock to left and right in squirmingembarrassment.
Dr. Hamilton's wife divorced him during this saga that was discussed in every cafeteria, meeting hub, and mop closet in the schools county wide. Dr. Hamilton has since gone back to his wife, poor woman to be fool enough to let him in the door, but now thanks to the Sarasota School board and other boards that throw around taxpayer money in the good-ol'-boy-and-girl-rape-the-tax-kitty system that seems to predominate in school boards. Dr. Hamilton bodes to pull down maybe a half million dollars a year from these lax school boards in the lobbying-consulting racket he has devised.
Pray, this taxpayer pleads, examine this appointment for equal opportunity hiring and suitability of the candidate to lobby for the state's children's needs. I don't want a character like Le Hamilton within 25 miles of my ten grandchildren, three of whom are now in Sarasota schools.
The citizens of your county elected you to stand guard of the schools to which they have entrusted their children and grandchildren. If you don't do this job and shield my grandchildren from Dr. Hamilton, I shall ask the funding agencies who give your schools grants to conduct compliance reviews and remove the grants because you don't deserve them.
Citizens should not have to reach beyond the local governing body of schools, the school boards, to get these boards to obey the laws. But a citizen, thank goodness, has that resource if school boards shirk their duty.
If you would be willing to explain why this apparently skilled teacher [Steve Kemp] is being kept busy as a paper pusher I would love to hear about it. Its not just Steve. Ms Griffin this could happen to any one of us. It happened to me. Ms. Kipley herself told me how the numbers of abuse complaints against teachers has tripled in the years she has been in charge of professional standards.
If I recall correctly, I posited that it might be helpful to give guidance to teachers on how to avoid these problems. It seems to me as long as administration is willing to let teachers twist in the wind and show them little support (not good politically I guess) this "problem" will only get worse. If these abuse complaints have tripled as she said we have a problem that NEEDS to be addressed NOW.
Any suggestion that it is in the interest of teachers to curtail their participation in discussing these issues in blogs is a self serving attempt to protect the status quo which, in my opinion, is tantamount to sacrificing teachers for political expediency.
Those are the matters I want to speak to you about. Are you willing to talk to me? I believe we can find a way not to violate Mr. Kemps right to due process and your obligation to remain unbiased. What do you think?
May 1, 2009 11:24 PM Blogger April Griffin said...
Mr. Vaughan,
I am always willing to discuss issues that will improve our district. I always have been. I will not discuss an employee who's case is not settled without that employees permission though. I would do the same for you and I hope you can respect that.
Please call or email me and we will talk about your experiences and suggestions. You have my number right?
At your service, April
May 2, 2009 10:30 AM
Teacher Lee's correction of grammar-punctuation errors:
Lee says:
I sent Mr. Kemp to Ms. Griffin for help with the child-abuse frame-up the administration has devised for him. He did not tell me what she said except that she said not to tell anybody that he had been to see her.
The latest wrinkle in this case is that Linda Kipley claims she did not get the three Political Standards charges against Smiley, Sosa, and What's-Her-Name that I sent Kipley in February. Kipley lies. She pulled the same scam when I filed charges against Dr. Hamilton for using the school mails for personal business two years ago. I have smartened up since then to such administration tactics. I had kept my files on the three-administrator charges and zapped a replacement to La Kipley instanter.
In a subsequent board session after her meeting with Kemp when Mr. Kemp's case came up for discussion, Ms. Griffin asked Mr. Valdez how long the investigation of the case would take. This question signaled that Ms. Griffin had not spoken to Mr. Valdez after her interview with Mr. Kemp. Otherwise, she would have known the answer to this question.
I don't believe Board Member Griffin had given Mr. Kemp's case a thought after her interview with him in which she told him that "things are going well behind the scenes." That is political claptrap. If Ms. Griffin wanted to help Teacher Kemp, she would have interviewed Mr. Valdez, the Teacher Torture Committee Enforcer behind the scenes, and she would have asked him for a written summary for the board of the status of the case and what he had left to do to wind it up so that Ms. Elia could make the recommendation that Linda Kipley had conveyed to Mr. Kemp when he asked her about child-abuse cases. Ms. Kipley, always all heart, said that she had never known one case of a charge of child abuse in the state that did not end in the teacher's dismissal.
You don't have to read all of Freud as I have to know that what the administration with board cooperation is conducting in Steve Kemp's and in other teachers' cases when they are caught in the Political Standards' spider net: it's psychological terror.
The administration and board want a teacher android to come out of that experience, one who has abandoned his blog. In Kemp's case; they want him to give up not only his blog but also his free-speech rights.
Some apparatchik from the administration called up Mr. Kemp and cited the particular subject that Ms. Elia did not want him to discuss on his blog.
What nerve. If you are a teacher, you must waive your Constitutional rights to keep a job in the school system. And this is happening in the world's most perfect democracy. And the board, which swore to uphold the Constitution, is pretending it does not know what is going on.
Something has gone haywire here.
The administration and board are bonkers about blogs and want them abolished. Ms. Elia is obsessed with good publicity, the kind produced by the Public Affairs Office about the schools and administration that spins truth until it disappears in a fog of allusion that takes the facts if unpleasant and converts them into an advertisement for how wonderful the board and administration are.
Back to the meeting of Kemp and Board Member Griffin: Why would a board member instruct a teacher not to tell anyone that she had met with him? Is she afraid of Ms. Elia and the rest of the rubber-stamp board members?
Why isn't it perfectly kosher for a board member to meet with a teacher? Teachers and their students are the heart and soul of the school system. So why aren't they at the center of a board member's concern instead of their being some kind of forbidden element that the board member does not want to be associated with? The public won't like that situation if it finds out about Ms. Griffin's attitude.
Such moral cowardice in a board member is a discouraging attitude from someone who claims she is pro-teacher. In fact, Ms. Griffin's is not a pro-teacher stance. It is an I-am-afraid-to-be-associated-with-teachers attitude because I am scared out of my shoes of Ms. Elia.
Why Ms. Griffin is afraid of Ms. Elia presents the puzzle. She is technically Ms. Elia's boss, but you would never know this unless you master the written hierarchy of board and administration. Ms. Griffin may also be afraid of another pile-on led by Carol Kurdell and Candy Olson for "being disloyal to the staff" when Griffin, in her salad days as board member, asked for an item on no-bid contracts to come off the agenda for discussion.
The staff's no-bid pick was a former administrator just starting out his consulting business with tapping into the administratorol'-boy-and-girl network of financial deep pockets supplied by tax payers who don't know what's going on. This situation provides a peek behind the Wizard-of-Oz curtain. where all board business gets decided and put on the Consent Calender merry-go-round, where it whizzes by unexamined to the taxpayers.
Ms. Griffin couldn't take the heat of other board members' disapproval (Susan Valdes supported her),so she has backed off from bringing any of the secretly decided consent agenda to the table for discussion and has not uttered an enlightened peep since that time.
The hush-hush Star Chamber Elia dictats that slide by on the Consent Agenda were what Publisher Patrick Manteiga of La Gacetacriticized in a recent issue of "As We Heard It." Mr. Manteiga condemned the shut-tight quality of the board agenda especially as it applied to the hiring of principals. His criticism could go to any item on the Consent Agenda. The Consent Agenda is secret and hidden from the public. Those principals' names should be on the Board Agenda with hyperlinks to their credentials for the voters' information.
I would like to have seen the candidates and their credentials who applied for the jobs that Dr. Lamb's and Ms. Edgecombe's children got as administrators (I heard both's children have school jobs). I suspect many of those competitors had credentials superior to the board members' children; those board-member children were hired in the superintendent's jobs program for relatives, sycophants, and buddies.
Ms. Elia runs this in-house jobs program with the board's collusion. Not one board member demurred when Ms.Elia ordered the hiring of Mr. Kipley's husband for an accounting job that required a degree and experience in the field that at least four other candidates had. I reviewed the applications. Mr. Kipley had only a high school degree and no experience. Where were the board members when this occurred? On the podium examining their cuticles.
I would like to be a fly on the wall listening to Mr.Thomas's and Ms. April's interview if he ever secures one from this increasingly politically glib and evasive board member. I wager that he will hear a whole lot of incumbent boilerplate from a board candidate who looked promising when she ran for office and who pledged much change for the better but who, when she got on the board, has turned out to have rolled over to the Elia juggernaut that dominates the board. She and others succumb to become a passive school board and dominant superintendent
I expect my blog will cost me my life in these, my golden years. The board and administration will hire a hit person (equal opportunity makes women able to tap into assassin jobs now, thanks be to the goddesses of women's rights). I will be found next to my ancient Mercedes in the parking lot on a board night, sprawled in a dead-as-door-nails slump. The board will rubber stamp the assassin's pay-off with tax funds, no questions asked even if the entry on the board's money page is "Assassin for Troublesome Blogger." My assassin's money at least will not go to administrators' bloated salaries that are in inverse proportion to these reluctant scholars' performance on the Stanford Binet.
I cannot let the grammar-and-punctuation errors of Ms. Griffin above go uncorrected in Board Member Griffin's comment. I have corrected her errors. Woe is me that I have to do this task for a school-board member.
But I am a teacher, after all, even in retirement. I insist that anybody who has not mastered basic grammar and punctuation that children's parents expect them to learn in K12 schools so that they can get jobs that do not involve flipping burgers should not be on a school board. That person should be in a classroom somewhere learning what he or she should have learned before: basic literacy.
Correction of Board Member April Griffin's Grammar and Punctuation:
Mr. Vaughan,
I am always willing to discuss issues that will improve our district. I always have been. I will not discuss an employee who's[WHOSE] case is not settled without that employees [POSSESSIVE: EMPLOYEE'S] permission though. I would do the same for you and [COMMA FOR COMPOUND SENTENCE] I hope you can respect that.
Please call or email me and [COMMA FOR COMPOUND SENTENCE] we will talk about your experiences and suggestions. You have my number right?
I emailed the charges directly to Linda Kipley, Ms. Cobbe.
If she says that she didn't get the charges, she is as usual lying. I cc'd people.
I know the last name of the top administrator: it was Smiley.I cannot recall the names of the principal and lower-level administrator involved.Their names would be on the child-abuse charge that Ms. Kipley and Ms. Elia filed against Steve Kemp.Please send me those three names and the job descriptions of each one so that I can refile the charges.
And don't tell me I have run out the clock.I filed in a timely fashion, and somebody found it convenient to lose charges against administrators instead of teachers. Lee Drury De Cesare
-----Original Message-----
From: Linda Kipley [mailto:Linda.Kipley@sdhc.k12.fl.us]
Sent: Wednesday, May 13, 2009 1:50 PM
To: lee
Cc: MaryEllen Elia; Candy Olson; carol.kurdell@sdhc.k12.fl; jennifer.falliero@sdhc.k12.fl.us; Jack Lamb; Susan Valdes; April Griffin; Patrickmanteiga@lagacetanewspaper.com; geneliudut@lagacetanewspaper.com; Stein@sptimes.com; Marilynbrown@tampatrib.com; Linda Cobbe; Ken Otero; Dan Valdez; Lewis Brinson; Gretchen Saunders; Wynne Tye; Cathy Valdes; 'Connie.'; David Steele; Gwen.Luney@sdhc.k12.fl.us; Stephen Hegarty
Subject: Re: results of my filing professional standards charges
Dear Ms. DeCesare:
In response to your request for this office's "findings on the unprofessional conduct of the three administrators involved in the dereliction of duty" in the "Kemp-case," no such records exist.
Replacement of file to Professional Standards that Ms. Kipley said she never got:
Ms. Cobbe: Please hand deliver this to Ms. Kipley, head of Professional Standards.
This is the second time Ms. Kipley has lied about a filing by me to Professional Standards.
I filed a Professional Standards charge against Dr. Hamilton for using the emails for personal matters. Ms. Kipley claimed she didn't get it. I had not saved a copy and at that early time in my career of monitoring the ROSSAC crimes against ethics did not know that Ms. Kipley has a career of lying so outrageously that the teachers at Hillsborough High wouldn't go into a conference with her without a tape recorder when she was principal there.
Instead of firing La Kipley when she had no more tolerence at HHS from the teachers because of her lying as they should have, top administration drafted her for the job of head of Professional Standards, a job of a higher rank than principal and more pay. This ROSSAC move confirms teachers' maxim that "If you mess up, you move up" in the administration. ldd
To: Linda Kipley, Professional Standards
From: Lee Drury De Cesare, citizen
2/11/09
Please consider this a formal complaint against Mr. Ron Smiley, head of Section 5 of Special Ed.
In the matter of the case of Steve Kemp’s alleged child-abuse charge filed by Mr. Smiley at the Sheriff’s Department, I protest its validity on the grounds that Mr. Smiley himself bears guilt in the situation for his not rendering to Mr. Kemp the help that Mr. Smiley’s job description clearly outlines:
• Help teachers develop a strategy for the instruction and assessment of the subject area curriculum so that every student develops to his maximum potential;
• Be responsible for assisting the administration in monitoring absences and arranging coverage of classes when no substitute is present;
• To insure dissemination of information and subject area supervisors to all members of the department and to insure understanding of all directives issued;
• To assist the Principal and Assistant Principal for Curriculum for evaluation of teachers within the department and, when necessary, work with teachers to improve instruction;
• To become a trained classroom observer eligible to serve on Preparing New Educator Teams.
• To work with teachers within the department to produce the highest standards of teaching (This includes visiting classrooms, making helpful suggestions for improving lesson plans, counseling with teachers within the department, and coordinating the work of the group to achieve departmental standards.
Although Mr. Smiley visited Mr. Kemp’s classroom, he spoke not a word to Mr. Kemp in accordance with the above directives. Instead after the lapse of a week, he went to the Sheriff’s Department and filed felony child-abuse charges against Mr. Kemp for his hooking the harness one student had on to a chair while he dealt with another child.
The sheriff’s office has dismissed the felony charge, but the administration continues its baseless charge against Mr. Kemp when it is the supervisory people like Mr. Smiley who should be cited for abuse of Professional Standards.
To: Linda Kipley, Professional Standards
From: Lee Drury De Cesare, citizen
2/11/09
Professional Standards charge against Principal Marion Ross of Special Ed
Please consider this a formal complaint against Principal Marion Ross of the Special Ed division.
In the matter of the case of Steve Kemp’s alleged child-abuse charge filed by Mr. Smiley. District 5 head, at the Sheriff’s Department, I protest its validity on the grounds that Ms. Ross along with Mr. Smiley and Ms Sosa bear guilt in the situation for their not rendering to Mr. Kemp the help that the three’s job description clearly outlines:
Ms. Ross’s Job Description:
• Proactivity: Demonstrates readiness to initiate action and take responsibility for leading and enabling others to improve the circumstances being faced or anticipated;
• Organizational Sensitivity: Is aware of the effects of his/her behavior and decisions on all stakeholders both inside and outside the organization;
• Oversees and is responsible for school’s instructional program…and its results;
• Oversees and is responsible for the safety and discipline of the school’s students;
• Oversees and is responsible for the accuracy and timeliness of school’s records and reports.
Ms. Ross gave Steve Kemp no assistance that coincides with the above duties of her job in this case. The only thing she said when she entered the room with Mr. Smiley and a physical therapist was that she “didn’t want to lose her job for child abuse.” She gave no help to Steve Kemp before she threw him into a classroom of severely retarded children. Steve had no education in or training to serve this student population. Ms. Ross gave Steve no advice or orientation to help him do the job right... In this lack Ms. Ross was derelict in her duties as a principal; thus I file Professional Standards charges against her.
To: Linda Kipley, Professional Standards
From: Lee De Cesare, citizen
Date: 2/11/09
Please consider this a formal complain of breech of professional standards by Supervisor Sosa in the Special Ed division. This charge is a refutation of the charge of child abuse against teacher Steve Kemp.
Ms. Sosa assigned Steve to the substitute duty of teaching profoundly retarded children without ascertaining his training.
Mr. Kemp has no academic credentials in caring for profoundly retarded children. His education is in teaching children who have trouble reading to read.
• Ms. Sosa’s job description says that her duties include the following;
• Provide support for ESE teachers at assigned school;
• Assist teachers in monitoring the effectiveness of curriculum and materials used in the classroom;
• Assist teachers in the pre-referral process of intervention strategies, observations, and conferences;
• Provide in-service for general education teachers as needed;
• Provide program-specific orientation and training for newly hired teachers;
• Assist in developing intervention strategies in regard to behavior management and school discipline;
Provide support for parents and function as a liaison to the school, parents, and community agencies.
Supervisor Sosa was derelict in these duties when she and Principal Ross threw Steve as a substitute in a room the population of which was profoundly retarded children. Neither she nor Ms. Ross gave Mr. Kemp any orientation or comments on his conducting this unfamiliar client base, not a word. This is dereliction of Supervisor Ross’s written duties, and I protest her behavior and ask that she be subject to a Professional Standards charge. Mr. Smiley was the Judas who had turned in Steve to the Sheriff’s Office; thankfully, the felony charge of child abuse went poof in the sheriff’s hands. He didn’t buy it. What sensible person not living in the alternative reality of the ROSSAC denizens would not have the same reaction?
Rumor has it that this is Ms. MaryEllen Elia's dog. I neither endorse nor deny the rumor. I simply pass it along for the delctation of the blogging faithful.
I append documents that I sent out today about the mistreatment of a third-grade teacher by one of Bradenton's principals and the board attorney.
I hope you three are tough and ethical.I have been an airline stewardess when you had to have a bachelor's or a nursing degree because air travel was special then, so the airlines could be picky about their stewardess; a registered nurse for 15 years in big city hospitals; and a college professor for 28 years until I retired.I am a mother of four and grandmother of ten. I have been married to the same old guy for fifty-three years.
The little town in Georgia where I was born and where my clan still lives continues a woman a fallen creature if she divorces no matter how bad the guy is. But they do treasure their children's and grandchildren's teachers and won't put up with the administration and board's mistreating them as has happened in the Bradenton schools.
When I retired, I decided to devote my spare time to improving the lot of teachers. The administrations and boards mistreat them all over Florida.That is not acceptable.
I learned to be tough when I was an 18-year-old student nurse.If you can't tell a post-operativepatient who wants to lie without moving, "Turn on your side, Mr. Jones; if you lie in one position for too long you will get a pulmonary embolism that could kill you" and stick by your order not paying any attention to the groaning you hear from the bed, then you are not tough enough to be an angel of mercy, a nurse.
I hope you are not afraid of the board.It is elected and is as scared as can be that the citizens will find out about something like this mistreated teacher scandal and kick them out of office as they should be.
I don't know what you can do to help the abused Ms. Mary Cropsey, but I know you are powerful enough to do something.Decide what to do and do it.
Find out why the union has sat on its hands in this case and done nothing to comfort Ms. Copsley.The awful thing about somebody's messing up with the administration is that everybody--including other teachers and the union--shun the person as if she has the plague.It is one of humankind's most cowardly reactions to suffering.I think it's why the citizens of Nazi Germany let Hitler and his henchmen kill six million Jewish men, women, and children and claimed they didn't know what was going on. I judge that behavior by the "good" citizens of Germany almost worse than the gas camps of the Nazis.
The union seems mighty uninvolved.I was president of the union at the college at which I taught as professor of English for 28 years, and we didn't leave teachers that theadministration with the board's sub rosa approval to torture teachers.
Do what you can to make Ms. Cropsey's situation as bearable as possible for her."The quality of mercy is not strained; it dropeth from heaven like the gentle rain," says Shakespeare.
I implore that you three see that Ms. Cropsey gets mercy from some source: you if it comes to that.History will judge us ill if we allow such vile punishment of a primary-grade teacher to go unchallenged.
Lee Drury De Cesare
15316 Gulf Boulevard 802
Madeira Beach, FL33708
tdecesar@tampabay.rr.com
Letter to the Editor, Bradenton Herald:
The Bradenton Pooh-Bahs' behavior in the crucifixion of local third-grade teacher Mary Cropsey by vindictive principal, Mike Rio and Board Attorney does not make them an adornment to journalism.
Whatever happened to the Crusading Press? Or is that just an instance of press puffery for its own ego?
Maybe a better question is What does the Bradenton Herald have against teachers?
The fact-packed Sarasota Herald Tribune piece below contrasts markedly with the short shrift of the Bradenton Herald report. Bradenton gives the news that celebrates the win over a grammar-school teacher of the Important People in Bradenton.
Hoi polloi teachers are not important in Bradenton Herald press values. Country Club minions are.
Let me get this straight: Are you moth-balled members of the Crusading Press that without editorial rebuke let a vindictive principal, one Mr. Rios, hold prayer meetings in the school on federal property, retaliate against third-grade teacher Ms. Mary Cropsey because she didn't attend the meetings and complained about them, and then when she won her discrimination case, Le Rios cooked up another case against her with the cooperation of the board attorney, one Mr. Bowen, Esquire, member of the bar but not ornament?
What about defending the Constitution, specifically separation of church and state? What about going to bat for the First Amendment, without which you Bradenton press biggies would be out of a job? The first thing dictators do is shut down the free press. Dictators wouldn't have to shut down the Bradenton Herald. It's been on dictators' side all along and would continue to be if Hitler goose-stepped into Bradenton from his aerie in South America and occupied City Hall.
What about fair labor practices? Is that federal law overruled by the BradentonSchool board's parochial, dim-witted pronunciamentos? Isn't it the job of the press to report such retaliatory actions as those of Mr. Rios and Board Attorney Bowen inflicted on Ms. Cropsley? Or is your job to hole up in epistemological loopholes of the Outback Press and act as advocate of the people in power?
Your readers don't agree with you. They love teachers. They mistrust the press and deservedly so in this case. Ms. Cropsey is a third-grade teacher. Everybody loves his or her third-grade teacher and all primary teachers. They are children's substitute mothers and fathers when children enter their first perilous adventure in the outside world. The children are scared. But their wonderful primary teachers make them feel safe. We remember and love those teachers forever. Sixty years ago my primary teachers were Ms. McPherson, first grade; Ms. Roberts, second grade; Ms. Byers, third grade; Ms. Roberts again, fourth grade; Ms. Lewis, fifth and sixth grades. Those teachers were the world's beauties and the world's wizards to me then, now, and forever. Primary teachers have a special place in every child's heart that never goes away.
And here you newspaper poseurs at the Bradenton Herald are trashing the Constitution, American workers, and primary teachers while upholding the skullduggery of an insecure, vindictive principal and his accomplice, and School Board Lawyer Bowen. God forbid that you should bestir yourself to ask the School Board to comment on the behavior of its principal and its lawyer. That would require you to skip the Chamber of Commerce luncheon with fellow Pooh-Bahs.
I am going to file a complaint against the school-board lawyer with the Florida Bar to complain about John Bowen's ethics when he failed to pass on the information to Ms. Cropsey's attorney that if Ms. Cropsey didn't show up despite her lawyer's advice that the Board would go along with that vindictive principal and fire her.
Shame, ladies and gentlemen of the press. You will not get a condo beside H. L. Mencken in Press Heaven for sure. You will be on the outskirts of paradise in the other-side-of-the-tracks locale of The National Inquirer stalwarts.
Lee Drury De Cesare
15316 Gulf Boulevard 802
Madeira Beach, FL33708
tdecesar@tampabay.rr.com
leedrurydecesarescasting-roomcouch.blogspot.com
Florida Bar
Ethics Division
5/13/2009
Dear Ethics Committee:
I would like to file an ethics charge against BradentonSchool Board Attorney John Bowen.
The Sarasota Herald's article below details Mr. Bowen's not informing third-grade teacher Ms. Mary Cropsey's attorney, Charles Britt. when the latter called him to tell Mr. Bowen that he, Mr. Britt, had advised Ms. Cropsey not to go to the meeting.
Mr. Bowen apparently also failed to inform Mr. Rios, the principal trying to set up Ms. Cropsey for firing after she had won her discrimination case, that the attorney for Ms. Cropsey had advised her not to attend the meeting with Mr. Rios. Mr. Bowen also failed to tell Mr. Britt that if Ms. Cropsey did not attend the meeting, that Mr. Rios could fire her.
I would also like to know the generals status of a school-board attorney's ethics. He sits on the board dais like a potted plant and did not advise the board that the Rios prayer meetings were unconstitutional, that anybody could complain about the school-based prayer meetings because people have First-Amendment license to do so, and that the restrictions on workers approved by the board violate the Fair Labor Practices provisions.
Thank you.
Respectfully,
(Ms.) Lee Drury De Cesare
15316 Gulf Boulevard 802
Madeira Beach, FL33708
tdecesar@tampabay.rr.com
Judge rules Manatee teacher shouldn't have been fired
ADVERTISEMENT
By TIFFANY LANKES
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
Published: May 2, 2009
MANATEE COUNTY - - Teacher Mary Cropsey's problems at Mills Elementary started the day she filed a formal complaint about the school's morning prayer meetings.
The next day she got a letter from Principal Mike Rio asking her to attend a meeting to discuss a "violation of FCAT procedures."
On the advice of her attorney, Cropsey skipped that meeting, and ultimately got fired for it.
Now, a judge has ruled that the ManateeCountySchool Board should not have fired her, and that Cropsey deserves back pay under her contract. The District Court of Appeal ruling filed Friday could also bolster a civil lawsuit Cropsey filed against the school district.
"When I walked out of that courtroom, I knew that I was going to win this one," Cropsey said. "The school district's position just doesn't make any sense."
The ruling highlights concerns over a Manatee school district policy that prohibits teachers under investigation from bringing private attorneys to meetings. The district adopted the rule several years ago as part of a policy intended to crack down on teachers accused of misconduct.
At least one other teacher has challenged his termination under the policy, and two other state boards have said the rule violates fair labor practices.
Friday's decision comes almost three years after Cropsey started as a third-grade teacher at Mills in the 2006-2007 school year.
Almost immediately she started having problems. Cropsey said that Principal Mike Rio and other school employees treated her like an outcast. She suspected that was because she is older and did not participate in the prayer meetings.
Cropsey was working on a one-year contract, and in February 2007 Rio informed her that he was not going to renew it.
A month later Cropsey went to the school district and lodged a discrimination complaint against Rio. The next day she received the notice about the meeting to discuss FCAT violations.
The letter did not detail the specific allegations -- which later turned out to be test cheating, a misdemeanor crime -- or state that Cropsey was under a formal investigation.
It stated she could bring representation, but did not elaborate that the district policy would only allow her to bring a union officer, not a private attorney.
Cropsey was suspicious when she received the letter and contacted an attorney, who advised her not to attend, fearing she might incriminate herself.
Her lawyer, Charles Britt, also called School Board attorney John Bowen to let him know he had advised Cropsey not to come. Bowen asked him to put that in writing, but did not tell him that Cropsey could lose her job for not attending.
Several months later the ManateeCountySchool Board found that there was no evidence Cropsey cheated on the FCAT. But it fired her anyway for not cooperating with the district's investigation.
It is not clear how widespread the implications of the ruling could be, but Bowen said it could impact public employers across Florida.
"They have basically said that an employee can, at the advice of an attorney, disobey what their employer tells them to do, which is a novel concept," Bowen said.
Bowen said the district can appeal the judge's decision to the state Supreme Court or ask for a rehearing in the second district. He said he needs to review the ruling before making a recommendation to the board.
Cropsey said she is ready to keep fighting if the district chooses to appeal.
"They're not going to wear me down," Cropsey said.
Cropsey said she had an extremely difficult time finding a job after the district accused her of FCAT cheating. Eventually, she found a job at a charter high school in ManateeCounty.
"Once you accuse someone of cheating on the FCAT, pretty much the only thing worse is accusing someone of molesting a child," Cropsey said.
BRADENTON — A federal court Monday dismissed teacher Mary Cropsey’s claim that the Manatee school district discriminated against her when she was fired in 2007 after she refused to participate in an investigation of possible wrongdoing.
The ruling of summary judgment filed in U.S. District Court in Tampa states: “Viewing the entirety of the record in the light most favorable to Cropsey, there are no genuine issues of material fact as to any of her claims,” according to a release from the school district.
The Bradenton Pooh-Bahs' behavior in the crucifixion of local third-grade teacher Mary Cropsey byvindictive principal, Mike Rio and Board Attorney does not make them an adornment to journalism.
Whatever happened to the Crusading Press? Or is that just an instance of press puffery for its own ego?
Maybe a better question is What does the Bradenton Herald have against teachers?
The fact-packed Sarasota Herald Tribune piece below contrasts markedly with the short shrift of the Bradenton Herald report. Bradenton gives the news that celebrates the win over a grammar-school teaccher of the Important People in Bradenton.
Hoi polloi teachers are not important in Bradenton Herald press values.
Let me get this straight: Are you moth-balled members of the Crusading Press that without editorial rebuke let a vindictiveprincipal, one Mr. Rios, hold prayer meetings in the school on federal property, retaliate against third-grade teacher Ms. Mary Cropsey because she didn't attend the meetings and complained about them, and then when she won her discrimination case, Le Rios cooked up another case against her with the cooperation of the board attorney, one Mr. Bowen, Esquire, member of the bar but not ornament?
What about defending the Constitution, specifically separation of church and state?What about going to bat for the First Amendment, without which you Bradenton press biggies would be out of a job? The first thing dictators do is shut down the free press. Dictators wouldn't have to shut down the Bradenton Herald. It's been on dictators' side all along and would continue to be if Hitler goosestepped into Brandenton from his aerie in South America and occupied City Hall.
What aboutfair labor practices?Is that federal law overruled by the BradentonSchool board's parochial, dim-witted pronunciamentos?Isn't it the job of the press to report such retaliatory actions as those of Mr. Rios and Board Attorney Bowen inflicted on Ms. Cropsley? Or is your job to hole up in epistemological loopholes of the Outback Press and act as advocate of the people in power?
Your readers don't agree with you.They love teachers.They mistrust the press and deservedly so in this case. Ms. Cropsey is a third-grade teacher.Everybody loves his or her third-grade teacher and all primary teachers.They are children's substitute mothers and fathers when children enter their first perilous adventure in the outside world.The children are scared.But their wonderful primary teachers make them feel safe. We remember and love those teachers forever.Sixty years ago my primary teachers were Ms. McPherson, first grade; Ms. Roberts, second grade; Ms. Byers, third grade; Ms. Roberts again, fourth grade;Ms.Lewis, fifth and sixth grades.Those teachers were the world's beauties and the world's wizards to me then, now, and forever.Primary teachers have a special place in every child's heart that never goes away.
And here you newspaper poseurs at the Bradenton Herald are trashing the Constitution, American workers, and primary teachers while upholding the skullduggery of an insecure, vindictive principal and his accomplice, and School Board Lawyer Bowen.God forbid that you should bestir yourself to ask the School Board to comment on the behavior of its principal and its lawyer. That would require you to skip the Chamber of Commerce luncheon with fellow Pooh-Bahs.
I am going to file a complaint against the school-board lawyer with the Florida Bar to complain about John Bowen's ethics when he failed to pass on the information to Ms. Cropsey's attorney that if Ms. Cropsey didn't show up despite her lawyer's advice that the Board would go along with that vindictive principal and fire her.
Shame, ladies and gentlemen of the press.You will not get a condo beside H. L. Mencken in Press Heaven for sure.You will be on the outskirts of paradise in the other-side-of-the-tracks locale of The National Inquirer stalwarts.
Lee Drury De Cesare
15316 Gulf Boulevard 802
Madeira Beach, FL33708
tdecesar@tampabay.rr.com
leedrurydecesarescasting-roomcouch.blogspot.com
Florida Bar
Ethics Division
5/13/2009
Dear Ethics Committee:
I would like to file an ethics charge against Bradenton School Board Attorney John Bowen.
The Sarasota Herald'sarticle below details Mr. Bowen's not informing third-grade teacher Ms. Mary Cropsey's attorney,Charles Britt. when the latter called him to tell Mr. Bowen that he, Mr. Britt, had advised Ms. Cropsey not to go to the meeting.
Mr. Bowen apparently also failed to inform Mr. Rios, the principal trying to set up Ms. Cropsey for firing after she had won her discrimination case, that the attorney for Ms. Cropsey had advised her not to attend the meeting with Mr. Rios.Mr. Bowen alsofailedto tell Mr. Britt that if Ms. Cropsey did not attend the meeting, that Mr. Rios could fire her.
I would also like to know the generalsstatus of a school-board attorney's ethics. He sits on the board dais like a potted plant and did not advise the board that the Rios prayer meetings were unconstitutional, thatanybody could complain about the school-based prayer meetings because people have First-Amendment license to do so, and that the restrictions on workers approved by the boardviolate the Fair Labor Practices provisions.
Thank you.
Respectfully,
(Ms.) Lee Drury De Cesare
15316 Gulf Boulevard 802
Madeira Beach, FL33708
tdecesar@tampabay.rr.com
Judge rules Manatee teacher shouldn't have been fired
ADVERTISEMENT
By TIFFANY LANKES
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
Published: May 2, 2009
MANATEE COUNTY - - Teacher Mary Cropsey's problems at Mills Elementary started the day she filed a formal complaint about the school's morning prayer meetings.
The next day she got a letter from Principal Mike Rio asking her to attend a meeting to discuss a "violation of FCAT procedures."
On the advice of her attorney, Cropsey skipped that meeting, and ultimately got fired for it.
Now, a judge has ruled that the Manatee County School Board should not have fired her, and that Cropsey deserves back pay under her contract. The District Court of Appeal ruling filed Friday could also bolster a civil lawsuit Cropsey filed against the school district.
"When I walked out of that courtroom, I knew that I was going to win this one," Cropsey said. "The school district's position just doesn't make any sense."
The ruling highlights concerns over a Manatee school district policy that prohibits teachers under investigation from bringing private attorneys to meetings. The district adopted the rule several years ago as part of a policy intended to crack down on teachers accused of misconduct.
At least one other teacher has challenged his termination under the policy, and two other state boards have said the rule violates fair labor practices.
Friday's decision comes almost three years after Cropsey started as a third-grade teacher at Mills in the 2006-2007 school year.
Almost immediately she started having problems. Cropsey said that Principal Mike Rio and other school employees treated her like an outcast. She suspected that was because she is older and did not participate in the prayer meetings.
Cropsey was working on a one-year contract, and in February 2007 Rio informed her that he was not going to renew it.
A month later Cropsey went to the school district and lodged a discrimination complaint against Rio. The next day she received the notice about the meeting to discuss FCAT violations.
The letter did not detail the specific allegations -- which later turned out to be test cheating, a misdemeanor crime -- or state that Cropsey was under a formal investigation.
It stated she could bring representation, but did not elaborate that the district policy would only allow her to bring a union officer, not a private attorney.
Cropsey was suspicious when she received the letter and contacted an attorney, who advised her not to attend, fearing she might incriminate herself.
Her lawyer, Charles Britt, also called School Board attorney John Bowen to let him know he had advised Cropsey not to come. Bowen asked him to put that in writing, but did not tell him that Cropsey could lose her job for not attending.
Several months later the ManateeCountySchool Board found that there was no evidence Cropsey cheated on the FCAT. But it fired her anyway for not cooperating with the district's investigation.
It is not clear how widespread the implications of the ruling could be, but Bowen said it could impact public employers across Florida.
"They have basically said that an employee can, at the advice of an attorney, disobey what their employer tells them to do, which is a novel concept," Bowen said.
Bowen said the district can appeal the judge's decision to the state Supreme Court or ask for a rehearing in the second district. He said he needs to review the ruling before making a recommendation to the board.
Cropsey said she is ready to keep fighting if the district chooses to appeal.
"They're not going to wear me down," Cropsey said.
Cropsey said she had an extremely difficult time finding a job after the district accused her of FCAT cheating. Eventually, she found a job at a charter high school in ManateeCounty.
"Once you accuse someone of cheating on the FCAT, pretty much the only thing worse is accusing someone of molesting a child," Cropsey said.
BRADENTON — A federal court Monday dismissed teacher Mary Cropsey’s claim that the Manatee school district discriminated against her when she was fired in 2007 after she refused to participate in an investigation of possible wrongdoing.
The ruling of summary judgment filed in U.S. District Court in Tampa states: “Viewing the entirety of the record in the light most favorable to Cropsey, there are no genuine issues of material fact as to any of her claims,” according to a release from the school district.
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