"Chancellor" Cathy Black Needs To Visit a School

[Hannah Bell]

You might have read about the riot that occurred at Murry Bergtraum HS (a high school placed in turnaround, old principal fired, new one got a $25K bonus) when a misguided principal decided to close the bathrooms in response to a fight.

http://gothamschools.org/2010/12/09/murry-bergtraum-students-riot-after-bathroom-access-denied/

I'm not going to comment on the actions of the principal or the students. I would like to say that things like this are more common than the public realizes.

I've been teaching a while, and I've broken up my fair share of fights...One time, a student shoved me into a chalkboard. Another time, I took a knife away from a student with nothing more than a stare. I don't expect kudos for these things; I'm simply stating that events like these are a fact of life in many public schools in NYC.

Michael Bloomberg and "Chancellor" Cathie Black would have it that teachers should be judged on Teacher Data Reports that allegedly take into account all kinds of factors. I don't know how they factor in working at a school in which the students riot, or carry knives, or beat each other, or curse out teachers, or kick them and cause miscarriages, but the city claims they can do it.

I'm more skeptical. Until you've worked in a dangerous school, you don't really know how difficult it is to teach in one. That's how I came up with the Bergtraum Solution...

You see, Bergtraum is a high school for business careers. As such, handling the students there should be a piece of cake for someone as forceful as former business maven Cathie Black...

I suspect the "Chancellor" will find the Bergtraum Solution less than appealing. She doesn't even have the courage to face real reporters, much less the adolescents of the schools she'd like to shutter. I'm sure she'll stick to well managed elementary schools where she can comment on the cute "little people" there.

She'll never go to a dangerous NYC high school...

http://www.accountabletalk.com/2010/12/chancellor-black-and-blue.html