S6731 Limits The Length Of Time To Appeal FOIL Violations

One of the most annoying things about the City Law Department is their close relationship to the New York State Supreme Court. I think the Corporation Counsel is too close:

• they pick and choose when to defend a teacher/principal/employee and when not to.
• they never pay any fees for motions, or any other filing
• they never have to appear at submissions because they can hand over their documents at any time....the submission date is for everyone else
• they can stop the implementation of a judge's decision by filing a Notice of Appeal, then take nine months to finish the Appeal brief.

The DOE Records Access person, Joe Baranello, seems to have trouble honoring the FOI Laws of New York State, and allows requests to remain unfilled for years. Recent legislation in the New York State Senate has put a stop to the lengthy appeal process.

Now I just wish that our Senate and Assembly would put a stop to the NYC Law Department postponing implementation of judges' decisions when these decisions go against them.

Betsy Combier

Limits the time state agencies would have to appeal article 78 supreme court
judgments against them for violations of freedom of information laws.

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Sponsor: BONACIC / Committee: INVESTIGATIONS AND GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS 
Law Section: Public Officers Law / Law: Amd S89, Pub Off L

S6731-2011 Actions

• Mar 14, 2012: REFERRED TO INVESTIGATIONS AND GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS

S6731-2011 Memo

BILL NUMBER:S6731

TITLE OF BILL:
An act
to amend the public officers law, in relation to limiting 

the amount of time to appeal certain judgments regarding 

freedom of information violations

PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL:
To expedite the appeals process when a trial court has 

found in favor of a FOIL request action, thereby insuring 

timely appellate review and conclusion to the issue.

SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS:
Adds a new paragraph (a) to Subdivision 4 of Section 89 

of the public officers law, requiring an appeal to be tiled 

within 30 days after a court judgement on a FOIL lawsuit, 

and abandons the request to appeal when an agency fails 

to serve and tile a brief within two months after the date 

of the notice of appeal.

Section 2: Authorizes an immediate effective date.

JUSTIFICATION:
The bill creates an expedited process for determining 

appeals of FOIL decisions. Under the present law, a denial 

of request for records may be overturned by a court, but 

the agency may tile a notice of appeal and have up to 9 

months to perfect the appeal. This delay, in some circumstances, 

may create an unfairness or a restriction of rights to
an individual; the delaying of disclosure, through the 

normal process of appeal, may make moot the individuals 

FOIL request and functionally deny them the timely access 

to documents needed. In addition, a speedier resolution 

reduces court costs borne by all parties.

PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
2009-10: A.6484 (Latimer) Referred to Governmental Operations

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
None.

EFFECTIVE DATE:
Immediately.

S6731-2011 Text

 S T A T E   O F   N E W   Y O R K
 
                                          6731
 I N  SENATE
 March 14, 2012
 
 Introduced  by  Sen. BONACIC -- read twice and ordered 

printed, and when  printed to be committed to the Committee 

on Investigations and Government Operations 

AN ACT to amend the public officers law, in  relation 

to  limiting  the amount of time to appeal certain 

judgments regarding freedom of information violations 

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, REPRESENTED IN 

SENATE AND ASSEMBLY, DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:

Section 1. Subdivision 4 of section 89 of the public officers 

law  is amended by adding a new paragraph (d) to read as follows:

 (D) APPEAL TO THE APPELLATE DIVISION OF THE SUPREME COURT 

MUST BE MADE IN  ACCORDANCE  WITH  LAW, AND MUST  BE FILED 

WITHIN THIRTY DAYS AFTER  SERVICE BY A PARTY UPON THE APPELLANT 

OF A COPY OF THE JUDGMENT OR ORDER APPEALED FROM AND WRITTEN 

NOTICE OF ITS ENTRY. AN APPEAL TAKEN FROM AN ORDER OF THE COURT 

REQUIRING DISCLOSURE OF ANY OR ALL RECORDS SOUGHT SHALL BE 

GIVEN PREFERENCE, SHALL BE BROUGHT ON FOR ARGUMENT ON SUCH
 TERMS  AND  CONDITIONS AS THE PRESIDING JUSTICE MAY DIRECT 

UPON APPLICATION OF ANY PARTY TO THE PROCEEDING, AND SHALL 

BE DEEMED ABANDONED  WHEN AN AGENCY FAILS TO SERVE AND FILE 

A RECORD AND BRIEF WITHIN TWO MONTHS AFTER THE DATE OF THE 

NOTICE OF APPEAL. 

S 2. This act shall take effect immediately.
 EXPLANATION--Matter in ITALICS (underscored) is new; matter 

in brackets  [ ] is old law to be omitted.
 LBD00716-01-1

Section 201-d of New York State Labor Law reads as if an employee cannot be terminated for engaging in recreational activities as follows (2(c)): "an individual's legal recreational activities outside work hours, off of the employer's premises and without use of the employer's equipment or other property;" Kauff McGuire & Margolis LLP also have a description of this Law on their website (1992) My reading of this Law says that Randi Lowitt, the Arbitrator who terminated Christine Rubino for Rubino's comments on her 'private' Facebook page while she was at home, may have not abided by this law. I will be sure to post her new decision in the Rubino case after she issues it (Barbara Jaffe,New York State Supreme Court judge who vacated Lowitt's decision of termination). § 201-d. Discrimination against the engagement in certain activities. 1. Definitions. As used in this section: a. "Political activities" shall mean (i) running for public office, (ii) campaigning for a candidate for public office, or (iii) participating in fund-raising activities for the benefit of a candidate, political party or political advocacy group; b. "Recreational activities" shall mean any lawful, leisure-time activity, for which the employee receives no compensation and which is generally engaged in for recreational purposes, including but not limited to sports, games, hobbies, exercise, reading and the viewing of television, movies and similar material; c. "Work hours" shall mean, for purposes of this section, all time, including paid and unpaid breaks and meal periods, that the employee is suffered, permitted or expected to be engaged in work, and all time the employee is actually engaged in work. This definition shall not be referred to in determining hours worked for which an employee is entitled to compensation under any law including article nineteen of this chapter. 2. Unless otherwise provided by law, it shall be unlawful for any employer or employment agency to refuse to hire, employ or license, or to discharge from employment or otherwise discriminate against an individual in compensation, promotion or terms, conditions or privileges of employment because of: a. an individual's political activities outside of working hours, off of the employer's premises and without use of the employer's equipment or other property, if such activities are legal, provided, however, that this paragraph shall not apply to persons whose employment is defined in paragraph six of subdivision (a) of section seventy-nine-h of the civil rights law, and provided further that this paragraph shall not apply to persons who would otherwise be prohibited from engaging in political activity pursuant to chapter 15 of title 5 and subchapter III of chapter 73 of title 5 of the USCA; b. an individual's legal use of consumable products prior to the beginning or after the conclusion of the employee's work hours, and off of the employer's premises and without use of the employer's equipment or other property; c. an individual's legal recreational activities outside work hours, off of the employer's premises and without use of the employer's equipment or other property; or d. an individual's membership in a union or any exercise of rights granted under Title 29, USCA, Chapter 7 or under article fourteen of the civil service law. 3. The provisions of subdivision two of this section shall not be deemed to protect activity which: a. creates a material conflict of interest related to the employer's trade secrets, proprietary information or other proprietary or business interest; b. with respect to employees of a state agency as defined in sections seventy-three and seventy-four of the public officers law respectively, is in knowing violation of subdivision two, three, four, five, seven, eight or twelve of section seventy-three or of section seventy-four of the public officers law, or of any executive order, policy, directive, or other rule which has been issued by the attorney general regulating outside employment or activities that could conflict with employees' performance of their official duties; c. with respect to employees of any employer as defined in section twenty-seven-a of this chapter, is in knowing violation of a provision of a collective bargaining agreement concerning ethics, conflicts of interest, potential conflicts of interest, or the proper discharge of official duties; d. with respect to employees of any employer as defined in section twenty-seven-a of this chapter who are not subject to section seventy-three or seventy-four of the public officers law, is in knowing violation of article eighteen of the general municipal law or any local law, administrative code provision, charter provision or rule or directive of the mayor or any agency head of a city having a population of one million or more, where such law, code provision, charter provision, rule or directive concerns ethics, conflicts of interest, potential conflicts of interest, or the proper discharge of official duties and otherwise covers such employees; and e. with respect to employees other than those of any employer as defined in section twenty-seven-a of this chapter, violates a collective bargaining agreement or a certified or licensed professional's contractual obligation to devote his or her entire compensated working hours to a single employer, provided however that the provisions of this paragraph shall apply only to professionals whose compensation is at least fifty thousand dollars for the year nineteen hundred ninety-two and in subsequent years is an equivalent amount adjusted by the same percentage as the annual increase or decrease in the consumer price index. 4. Notwithstanding the provisions of subdivision three of this section, an employer shall not be in violation of this section where the employer takes action based on the belief either that: (i) the employer's actions were required by statute, regulation, ordinance or other governmental mandate, (ii) the employer's actions were permissible pursuant to an established substance abuse or alcohol program or workplace policy, professional contract or collective bargaining agreement, or (iii) the individual's actions were deemed by an employer or previous employer to be illegal or to constitute habitually poor performance, incompetency or misconduct. 5. Nothing in this section shall apply to persons who, on an individual basis, have a professional service contract with an employer and the unique nature of the services provided is such that the employer shall be permitted, as part of such professional service contract, to limit the off-duty activities which may be engaged in by such individual. 6. Nothing in this section shall prohibit an organization or employer from offering, imposing or having in effect a health, disability or life insurance policy that makes distinctions between employees for the type of coverage or the price of coverage based upon the employees' recreational activities or use of consumable products, provided that differential premium rates charged employees reflect a differential cost to the employer and that employers provide employees with a statement delineating the differential rates used by the carriers providing insurance for the employer, and provided further that such distinctions in type or price of coverage shall not be utilized to expand, limit or curtail the rights or liabilities of any party with regard to a civil cause of action. 7. a. Where a violation of this section is alleged to have occurred, the attorney general may apply in the name of the people of the state of New York for an order enjoining or restraining the commission or continuance of the alleged unlawful acts. In any such proceeding, the court may impose a civil penalty in the amount of three hundred dollars for the first violation and five hundred dollars for each subsequent violation. b. In addition to any other penalties or actions otherwise applicable pursuant to this chapter, where a violation of this section is alleged to have occurred, an aggrieved individual may commence an action for equitable relief and damages. Section: Previous Article 7 200 200-A 201 201-A 201-B 201-C 201-D 201-E 201-F 202 202-A 202-B 202-C 202-D Next Last modified: March 30, 2010 I also ask the reader to look at this on the website of Kauff McGuire & Margolis LLP: New Law Protects New York Employees From Discrimination Based on Legal Off-Duty Conduct October 1, 1992 Under a new statute, New York employers may not take adverse employment actions against employees or applicants for employment on the basis of their legal, off-duty conduct. The new law, section 201-d of the Labor Law, which takes effect on January 1, 1993, grew out of efforts by the tobacco lobby to prevent employers from discriminating against employees who smoke. The final version of the law, however, goes beyond merely protecting smokers. The statute broadly defines a variety of legal activities that, if engaged in on an employee's own time and without the use of company property or equipment, may not form the basis for adverse employment decisions. The law creates four areas of "protected" employee activities: (1) political activities, such as campaigning or fund-raising; (2) legal recreational activities, broadly defined to include virtually all non-compensated leisure time activity; (3) the legal use of consumable products, off company property and outside of working time; and (4) membership in a union or the exercise of rights related to union activity. It is unlawful for an employer to "refuse to hire, employ or license, or to discharge from employment or otherwise discriminate against" an employee because of the employee's protected activities. An aggrieved employee may file suit for equitable relief and damages, or the Attorney General may sue for injunctive relief and for a civil fine. The statute does not provide for recovery of attorney's fees by a prevailing plaintiff. As with many broadly worded anti-discrimination statutes, this new law is subject to several exceptions. Employers should be wary, however, when seeking to take advantage of the exceptions to the law because the courts have not yet had the opportunity to interpret the sometimes ambiguous terms. The major exceptions to the law's scope are: (i) professional journalists, and civil servants who are prohibited by law from engaging in political activity, are excluded from the protection for political activity; (ii) off-duty conduct is not protected where engaging in the activity "creates a material conflict of interest related to the employer's trade secrets, proprietary information or other proprietary or business interest" or, as to any public employee, would violate local ethics or conflict of interest regulations; (iii) an employer does not violate the statute if actions are taken in accordance with obligations imposed under a collective bargaining agreement or a personal services contract with a professional employee; and (iv) an employer does not violate the statute if actions are taken against an employee "based on the belief" that the action is "required by statute, regulation, ordinance, or other governmental mandate" or is warranted based on behavior "deemed by an employer to constitute habitually poor performance, incompetency or misconduct." Of particular concern to employers is the application of the new law to employee anti-smoking rules, drug and alcohol abuse programs, anti-dating and anti-moonlighting rules, and employee benefit plans. First, despite the origins of the statute as a protection for employees who smoke, it is critical to note that the statute only protects activity that occurs off company property and outside of working time. Therefore, a company policy prohibiting smoking either during working hours or on the company's premises is permitted under the new statute. Similarly, compliance with local ordinances concerning smoking in public places may be observed without running afoul of the new law. The statute also specifically authorizes actions taken by employers under an established substance abuse program or workplace policy, including such provisions in a collective bargaining agreement. Thus, a workplace rule prohibiting the consumption of alcoholic beverages before reporting to work may be exempt from the new law's protection. Of course, any employee's conduct while on working time (such as being under the influence of alcohol) is clearly outside the protection of this new law. Of greater concern are employer-sponsored drug testing programs. Although the use of illegal drugs is not protected by the new law, the use of legal drugs (such as prescription medication) is protected. Consequently, any drug testing program that does not effectively differentiate between an employee's legal and illegal drug use may be in violation of the law. The new law has no application to an anti-moonlighting rule, because only non-compensated leisure time activities are protected. An employer's policy prohibiting dating between co-workers, however, may be prohibited by the statute, depending on whether the courts interpret dating to be a "recreational" activity (although, even then, an employer could argue that a particular dating relationship creates such a serious conflict of interest that it would fall within one of the exceptions to the law's prohibitions discussed above). Finally, with respect to employee benefit plans, the law specifically permits an employer to maintain a health or benefit plan "that makes distinctions between employees for the type of coverage or the price of coverage based upon the employees' recreational activities or the use of consumable products." Thus, medical insurance may be charged to a smoker at a higher rate than to a non-smoker, without violating the new law. For most employers, the impact of this new law on the day-to-day operation of the company will be limited. Unless an employer has an established policy prohibiting dating between co-workers or of not hiring smokers (whether or not they smoke on the job), democrats, or employees who have high-risk hobbies, the new law may be of little practical consequence. Nevertheless, the new law represents a significant limitation on the traditional New York rule of employment-at-will, and employers should be sensitive to the possible ramifications of the new law for employment actions based on employee conduct that occurs off the job.

From Betsy Combier: 

A story in today's NY POST reminds me of the rubberization process.

Once again, let me repeat that the focus of my advocacy is on the rights people have to face their accuser(s) and to have their side of the story be told to a neutral party for a fair and just resolution. Thus, even if a person is guilty of something doesnt mean, in my opinion, that they can/should/must be fired. Every case is unique and involves circumstances and situations that may mitigate punishment. I believe that every action of anyone involved in a case can and should be looked at. Here is where my approach differs from NYSUT and most Attorneys, who do not want to delve into the case given to them for any number of reasons.

Of course, judges, lawyers and politicians pretend to "know" the facts, but if you try to get the facts out by asking the people you have hired to help you, like attorneys and union reps., often you get attacked for asking, because they haven't looked at the documents you brought for them to read. 

The Constitutional due process protections that we all reply on have effectively been adjudicated out of existence by Mayoral control, biased 3020-a arbitrators, advocates who speak about ed reform who dont do anything but talk (more about this in later posts) and judicial immunity. 

The police Sargeant below has a taste of the medicine given to all those people I salute: people who say, "Hey, there's something wrong here" and "What are we going to do about it?" The answer is often, "Nothing", but we are going to silence you for asking."

This is how the rubber rooms often works, and remember that I see the "rubber room" as a process, not a place:

A Department of Education employee shows higher ups that he/she is not a "yes" person - that is, he/she does his/her job, reports suspected abuse of children by anyone, including school personnel, and asks questions about IEPs, payment for services, the CEP (See the story about Francesco Portelos here and here) etc. All the while, and unbeknownst to this hard-working employee, the "higher ups" (Principal, AP, Dean, teacher, PIP+ consultant, Superintendent, 'legal', SCI, OSI, OEO, DA, NYPD, Borough President,etc) have already been alerted by a telephone call or email that he/she needs to be 'taken care of'.

Tenured employees were, up until 2010, placed into warehouses called Temporary Reassignment Rooms (also called TRCs or "rubber rooms"). Everyone was paid while sitting there and told to be happy by the UFT, because they were getting paid to sit there... thus supposedly no harm was done. Employees displaced into these locations were also told by the UFT reps (not me) that they should not discuss any part of their case with anyone. Many were afraid to talk with me when I was hired in 2007 by Randi Weingarten to visit the rubber rooms and find out what each person's case was all about. Some reps tried to convince rubber roomers I was in on this by telling the employee "Betsy works for us, be careful, she isnt who she says she is", etc, and I found this out afterwards even up to today, with the names of the people from the UFT and NYSUT who are saying this. It doesn't matter. What matters is that people were threatened with harm by UFT Reps NYSUT and DOE for trying to assert their rights to due process and find out why they were charged, and how they could address the charges or allegations if known.

In order for anyone charged to be punished (Mayor Bloomberg hates to be proven wrong at any time), the Department of Education and the UFT/NYSUT created a fake "opportunity" by which charged people could get back to their careers or at least their lives: settlement, retirement, resignation, or pay money to go back to work, guilty or not. This was a lie, created to get someone permanently removed from the teaching profession. A person who signs a settlement agrees that he/she is guilty of the charge and waives his/her right to file any legal action against the DOE in the future.After signing the agreement, as soon as the person is placed back into a school setting, he or she is open for allegations to be filed against him/her once again, for any or no reason. The second time around the person always gets terminated.

My answer to the scam going on to get rid of good and bad teachers (but no one knows who is "good" and who is "bad"): expose everything anyone says to you, have an open and public hearing, and keep posting, emailing and talking about everyone in your case who has said or done anything improper. Cockroaches hate light.

Sgt Borelli, in the article below, evidently has been rubberized.

Sgt. Robert Borelli

Whistleblowing NYPD sergeant had a hand in crime spike in Queens precinct: sources

By LARRY CELONA, KIRSTAN CONLEY and JAMIE SCHRAM

Last Updated:12:22 PM, March 24, 2012

Posted:1:23 AM, March 24, 2012

LINK

A whistleblowing NYPD sergeant had a hand in the monstrous spike in crime that plagued a Queens precinct last year when his scrutiny of fellow cops’ official reports prompted them to properly classify a wave of felony complaints, law-enforcement sources said yesterday.

For doing his job, Sgt. Robert Borrelli was banished to an abysmal night shift at Central Booking in the basement of the South Bronx criminal courthouse, the sources said.

“This guy is definitely a significant reason for the crime [spike]” in the 100th Precinct, one police source said, pointing out that “you could correlate when he started looking at the [complaints] to the increase in crime in this precinct.”

In December, The Post first reported that the Rockaways were getting rocked by a crime wave.

Burglaries jumped 144 percent, from 54 the previous year to 132. Felony assaults climbed 66 percent from 78 to 130 and robberies rose 31 percent from 63 to 83.

The 47-year-old cowboy cop, who’s eligible to retire and collect his full pension in just 18 months, threatened to go to Internal Affairs if anyone downgraded a single crime, a police source said.

“He made sure that everybody did it the way they were supposed to. He was making sure it was being done by the book,” the source said.

On one occasion, Borrelli got into a beef with the squad commander over a burglary report and contacted the complainant in his quest to make sure the crime was accurately reported, sources said.

“They’re downgrading shootings to reckless endangerment when they should be attempted assault,” Borrelli told The Post, adding that it was done “to keep the crime index low, as well as [downgrading] plenty of other felonies.”

He took his claims to Internal Affairs, but investigators insist they claims are baloney, sources said.

One source called him a “loose cannon” and a “malcontent” with a long disciplinary history.

Additional reporting by Michael Gartland

larry.celona@nypost.com

Bloomberg: No Donated Food For The Homeless

 Bloomberg's Idea of Community

Bloomberg says the hungry eat enough already.

LINK

As if anyone needed any more proof that Bloomberg was bent on destroying anything related to community-building in New York City, the New York Post reports this:

So much for serving the homeless.

The Bloomberg administration is now taking the term “food police” to new depths, blocking food donations to all government-run facilities that serve the city’s homeless.

In conjunction with a mayoral task force and the Health Department, the Department of Homeless Services recently started enforcing new nutritional rules for food served at city shelters. Since DHS can’t assess the nutritional content of donated food, shelters have to turn away good Samaritans.

Anyone who needs a crash course in how to sterilize communities just needs to follow the Michael Bloomberg playbook:

a) Destroy large public schools that served communities for over 100 years and replace them with small gimmick and corporate charter schools.

b) Kick out the poorest and neediest religious congregations from school buildings under the guise of protecting church-state separation.

c) Institute “stop and frisk” and use the police department as your own personal army.

d) Prevent all food donations to the homeless.

Of course, all of these policies have to be clad in a concern for the people. Shutting down “failing schools” is good.  Protecting the sanctity of church-state separation is good. “Stop and frisk” protects the city from terrorism. Those food donations are too high in sodium for the starving people of the city. Only his cronies are capable of dolling out highly nutritious slop, since independent donations might reduce the need for millionaire food contractors.

We are living in a completely authoritarian and corporatized fiefdom run by a man who sees himself as a feudal lord. And why not? Like many other lords, he bought his title fair and square.

Rubberization And the Decline of Student Achievement

One of the telltale signs that the leadership of the New York City Department of Education wants to deliberately harm children in the public schools under their care is the fact that when principals exercise their power to remove anyone for any reason at any time and make up allegations that stick at 3020-a arbitration (or U-rating appeals, grievances, etc) like silly putty thrown against a wall, the charged employee is replaced by someone not qualified to teach the class.

This fact can be seen in any classroom, physical education, art, English, Social Studies, Regents classes, it doesn't matter. All that matters is that the employee is out of the classroom in which he/she is accused (rightly or wrongly). Often, Principals are "ordered" to remove someone, and told to do so immediately. So in their defense, they are not always given time to hire a person licensed to teach the subject, nor do they have the teaching staff to move teachers in who DO know the curriculum to replace the now absent teacher.

In order to cover up the chaos that often results in this process when a teacher is suddenly removed, principals scrub grades, change testing dates, suspend kids who "know" what happened, and lie to parents concerned about their child(ren)'s progress in the class....especially near to test times.

I always thought that if the NYC DOE gave any oversight to the "rubberization" process (sudden removal of teachers for any reason and placement of the accused in a hostile environment) they would have to consider the effect of the process while giving the authority to principals and Superintendents to remove anyone on a whim. But Bloomberg did not do that, and this is a cornerstone  his legacy.

The article below elaborates on the effect the last 10 years has had on students in the NYC public schools as well as elsewhere.

Betsy Combier

Teacher Turnover Affects All Students' Achievement, Study Indicates

By Stephen Sawchuk, Teacher Beat  on March 21, 2012 12:45 PM

LINK

When teachers leave schools, overall morale appears to suffer enough that student achievement declines—both for those taught by the departed teachers and by students whose teachers stayed put, concludes a study recently presented at a conference held by the Center for Longitudinal Data in Education Research. 
The impact of teacher turnover is one of the teacher-quality topics that's been hard for researchers to get their arms around. The phenomenon of high rates of teacher turnover has certainly been proven to occur in high-poverty schools more than low-poverty ones. The eminently logical assumption has been that such turnover harms student achievement.

But a couple years back, two researchers did an analysis  that showed, counter-intuitively, it's actually the less- effective teachers, rather than the more- effective ones, who tend to leave schools with a high concentration of low-achieving, minority students. It raised the question of whether a degree of turnover might be beneficial, since it seemed to purge schools of underperforming teachers.

When reporting on that study, I played devil's advocate by pointing out that it didn't address the cultural impact of having a staff that's always in flux. The recently released CALDER paper suggests I may have been right in probing this question.

Written by the University of Michigan's Matthew Ronfeldt, Stanford University's Susanna Loeb, and the University of Virginia's Jim Wyckoff, the new paper basically picks up on the same question. Even if overall teacher effectiveness stays the same in a school with turnover, it's well documented that turnover hurts staff cohesion and the shared sense of community in schools, the scholars reasoned. Could that have an impact on student achievement, too?

To find out, they looked at a set of New York City test-score data from 4th and 5th graders over the course of eight years. The data were linked to teacher characteristics. 
(All the usual caveats about limitations of test scores apply, of course.)

Among their findings:

• For each analysis, students taught by teachers in the same grade-level team in the same school did worse in years where turnover rates were higher, compared with years in which there was less teacher turnover. 
• An increase in teacher turnover by 1 standard deviation corresponded with a decrease in math achievement of 2 percent of a standard deviation; students in grade levels with 100 percent turnover were especially affected, with lower test scores by anywhere from 6 percent to 10 percent of a standard deviation based on the content area.
• The effects were seen in both large and small schools, new and old ones. 
• The negative effect of turnover on student achievement was larger in schools with more low-achieving and black students.

"Turnover must have an impact beyond simply whether incoming teachers are better than those they replaced—even the teachers outside of this redistribution are somehow harmed by it," the authors conclude. "Though there may be cases where turnover is actually helpful to student achievement, on average, it is harmful."

They authors call for more research to identify the mechanics of the decline—whether a loss of collegiality, or perhaps a loss of institutional knowledge among the staff due to turnover, is the cause of the lower achievement.

Doubts About High-Stakes Tests and Their Effect on Teachers

March 20, 2012, 10:47 a.m.

By ANNA M. PHILLIPS

Schoolbook

LINK

Shael Polakow-Suransky, the chief academic officer of the New York Education Department; Sean Feeney, a principal; and Elijah Hawkes, a former principal.

The chief academic officer of New York City’s public schools said on Monday night that principals were not alone in being concerned about the state’s new teacher evaluation system: He also has qualms.

At a panel discussion on high-stakes testing held at the Brooklyn Secondary School for Collaborative Studies, Shael Polakow-Suransky, the chief academic officer for the city’s Education Department, told a packed auditorium that the new law contained “real risks,” for teachers and principals alike.

Quietly passed into law by the State Legislature last week, the evaluation system calls for 60 percent of a teacher’s annual review to be based on subjective measures, like classroom observations and feedback from students. The remaining 40 percent is drawn from student achievement — 20 percent from growth on the state math and English exams, and 20 percent from assessments that districts can select and design.

Teachers who score below 65 points out of 100 will be rated ineffective, creating the potential for a principal to give a teacher a perfect score of 60 points on the subjective portion, only to have the teacher labeled ineffective if her score on the achievement portion is very low.

“A principal should not ever be in a situation where ultimately their judgment gets trumped by a mechanistic formula,” Mr. Polakow-Suransky said, adding that while he objected to such a scenario, he expected it to be a rare occurrence. “Ultimately there needs to be enough flexibility for the principal and the teacher to have a conversation about the work that’s happening” inside of the school, he said.

Sean Feeney, principal of the Wheatley School on Long Island and a co-author of a position paper opposing the new evaluation system, argued that the formula’s ability to override a principal’s opinion suggested “the lunacy of the system.” Mr. Feeney and other principals have called for lawmakers to eliminate the evaluation system’s use of students’ scores on the state math and English exams until after new, potentially improved assessments have been phased in years from now.

The panelists also debated the effects that the state standardized exams have had on schools, where they are administered every year to students in grades 3 to 8. While Mr. Feeney and Elijah Hawkes, the former principal of the James Baldwin Expeditionary Learning School, argued that the tests had narrowed the curriculum in schools across the state, Mr. Polakow-Suransky said that many schools had continued to offer students a full experience.

Parents and teachers in the audience — who applauded when Mr. Feeney called the state’s standardized tests “flawed” — said the effect of high-stakes testing was most apparent in schools in poor neighborhoods. One woman introduced herself as the mother of two children at Public School 8 in Brooklyn Heights, and a teacher at a school in Oceanhill-Brownsville. While her own children learn to be inquisitive and think critically, her students’ days are full of mind-numbing test prep.

“Every single day my students sit through two hours of testing to practice,” she said. “They are bored out of their minds; they are miserable; they are angry; they get in fights at recess. Yes, my students are learning; they are learning how to take tests.”

Mr. Polakow-Suransky said that while this constant practice had been a part of some schools for decades, it was not effective and would not produce the desired payoff in test scores the principal may be seeking.

“I should add that my school gets an A,” the teacher said, referring to the Education Department’s practice of giving A through F letter grades to public schools every year.

Dao Tran, whose daughter attends a school in the South Bronx, said that teachers were spending time instructing young children in how fill out bubble sheets; meanwhile, the school has no money for field trips.

“In her school, I don’t see how it’s helping the kids, I don’t see how it’s helping the community, all I see the money is not there,” she said.

Anna M. Phillips is a member of the SchoolBook staff. Follow her on Twitter @annamphillips.

Francesco Portelos' Online Story Brings Retaliation By The NYC DOE And Principal Linda Hill

UPDATE

When the post below was published on this blog March 18, 2012, we thought Francesco Portelos was a whistleblower and a hero.

No longer.

In our opinion, Francesco Portelos is a cyberbully, who loves to threaten people who criticize him or don't want to do whatever wrong he wants them to do.

See here:

Editorial: Is Francesco Portelos a Danger to Tenure Law? by Betsy Combier

Francesco Portelos' Poison - Threats To Principals

Francesco Portelos: "A Troublemaking, Combative, and Disgruntled Employee", Loses His Federal Case by Editor Betsy Combier

Francesco Portelos and His "Victim Complex"

OP-ED: Why Cyberstalker Francesco Portelos and His Bully Mob, UFT Solidarity, Failed

Parents against teacher tenure say they're being harassed by educator

EDITORIAL: Cyberstalker Francesco Portelos and His Blame Game Must Be Stopped

Teacher’s tweets threaten kids in tenure suit: parents

Contact me if you are being charged with 3020-a, have had a bad experience with Francesco Portelos, or have been in a "new" rubber room at betsy.combier@gmail.com.

Betsy Combier, betsy.combier@gmail.com
Editor, ADVOCATZ.com
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, NYC Public Voice
Editor, Inside 3020-a Teacher Trials

This story is one of retaliation. 

A friend and retired teacher sent me Francesco Portelos' blog "Don't Tread On Mr. Portelos" and I posted his blog entries on my blog and website, here and here, because Portelos wanted the actions of his Principal exposed. I gave Mr. Portelos and Jim Calantjis the "A FOR ACCOUNTABILITY" Award for exposing the wrongful actions of IS 49 Principal Linda Hill as cited by Mr. Portelos in his posting of the emails of Ms. Hill showing the lack of transparency in the school's CEP data.

The school's NYYSED/NYCDOE JOINT INTERVENTION TEAM REPORT AND RECOMMENDATIONS cite data about the school that are not good and need to be fixed. My experience with this sort of situation is that the Principal, now embarrassed with the exposure of his/her actions, goes after the whistleblower and tries to get the messenger charged with something. Portelos knew this, and for the reason of protecting his status, and exposing the retaliation, he chose to publicize the actions taken against him.

Francesco Portelos

The manner in which the NYC Department of Education removes tenured employees from schools, charges them, and terminates or fines them, is not lawful. This is my opinion, for all you who are waiting in the wings to take me out, and I am not an Attorney so this is not legal advice. What everyone who is attacked or harassed should do is immediately write a Notice of Claim and send it to the Bureau of Law and Adjustment. Filing a Notice of Claim opens the door to your filing a lawsuit against the City of New York for a year and 90 days. No NYSUT Attorney has told any of the many clients this, but look into General Municipal Law Section 50-e and you will see what I mean. Do not waive your rights to sue your attackers.

The education mafia simply must avoid exposure at all times. They must keep their actions secret from the public because the public relations team working at Tweed cant spin fantasies out of documents that are visible, and Bloomcott (Mike Bloomberg + Dennis Walcott) know how lethal whistleblowers can be.

In fact, Francesco is in the NY POST today as a result of his blog, my blog, Facebook and Twitter:
Tech Teacher in Staten Island Chronicles Tiff With Principal Online 

IS 49 Principal Linda Hill

Now, Ms. Hill will push for charges against Francesco, such as he "revealed confidential emails" - oh really? Emails sent via a DOE computer are FOIL-able, so the fact of the matter is that I have filed a FOIL request for all of Principal Hill's emails as they refer to Francesco Portelos and/or the School Leadership Team and the Comprehensive Educational Plan (CEP).

This case is beginning to look alot like the case against Christine Rubino, in terms of stretching the envelope on what teachers can or cannot say on the Internet. I have heard that the teacher, David Senatore, who handed Christine's facebook comment to the Principal Lisa Esposito, was removed from the school on wednesday March 14, 2012. He may now get a taste of his own medicine.

Wrongful Termination Laws: Illegal Reasons

 LINK

You should always be mindful of wrongful termination laws. Firing someone for the wrong reason could land you in a whole lot of legal hot water.

A majority of all employees in the United States are "at will" employees. What this means is that you can fire these employees at any time and for any reason, so long as the reason is not discriminatory, retaliatory or otherwise illegal.

Both state and federal laws are in place that prohibit employers from firing employees for certain reasons. These wrongful termination laws will apply whether the employee is at will or the employee is working under an employment contract.

Wrongful Termination Laws: Discrimination

Under federal law, it is illegal for employers to fire an employee because of the employee's race, gender, national origin, disability, religion or age (so long as the employee is at least 40 years old). In addition to these "protected classes," federal law also makes it illegal for employers to fire an employee because she is pregnant or has a medical condition that is related to her pregnancy or childbirth.

A majority of states also have wrongful termination laws that prevent employers from terminating employees for all of the reasons listed under the federal laws. Some states also take their wrongful termination laws further and add more "protected classes."

For example, some states also include sexual orientation in this list of protected classes. An employer in such a state would be prohibited from terminating an employee just because they were gay or lesbian. In addition, some states write their wrongful termination laws in such a way that they cover a wider ranger of employers than the federal laws do.

Wrongful Termination Laws: Retaliation

Generally speaking, it is illegal for an employer to terminate an employee for asserting his or her rights under federal or state anti-discrimination laws. Employees have been known to build successful retaliation claims even when the underlying discrimination claim doesn't work out in their favor. As an example, if you fired an employee for complaining that she was not receiving equal pay to the men in similar positions, you may end up losing a retaliation lawsuit even if you end up showing that your pay schedules were not discriminatory based on gender.

Wrongful Termination Laws: Refusing to Take a Lie Detector Test

Under the federal Employee Polygraph Protection Act, employers are not allowed to fire employees on the basis that they refused to take a lie detector test. In addition to this federal law, many states also have laws that prohibit employers from firing employees because they refused a polygraph test.

Wrongful Termination Laws: Aliens

Under the federal Immigration Reform and Control Act, employers are prohibited from firing employees on the basis of their alien status. So long as the employee is legally eligible for employment within the United States, an employer cannot fire that employee solely on the basis of their alien status.

Wrongful Termination Laws: Complaints about OSHA Violations

Under the federal Occupation Safety and Health Act (OSHA), employers are prohibited from terminating employees because they make complaints about the employer's OSHA violations. These complaints are often made about an employer that does not meet state or federal health and safety standards.

Wrongful Termination Laws: Violations of Public Policy

There are a number of states that have laws that prohibit employers from terminating employees when the terminations are in violation of public policy. In other words, these laws stop employers from firing employees for reasons that the public would find morally reprehensible or ethically wrong. These laws are often difficult for employers to follow, as morals and ethics are subjective and will vary from state to state. It is not uncommon for some state laws to differ form the laws of other states.

However, despite this subjectivity, there are some common themes that are found in many states' laws. Many states agree that the following would be in violation of public policy:

• Terminating an employee because he or she refused to commit an illegal act that was ordered of her by a superior (such as refusing to destroy documents that must be maintained according to state or federal law).
• Terminating an employee because the employee complained about his or her employer's illegal activities (such as firing an employee that made a complaint to the federal government about his employer's illegal dumping of toxic materials). These laws are often referred to as "whistleblower statutes."
• Terminating an employee because the employee exercised his or her legal right (such as taking a permissible family leave).

Employer Fears about Wrongful Termination Laws

Even the most careful employer that follows all of the guidelines that are set out above can feel uncomfortable about wrongful termination laws. Many employers fear that a former employee will come back with a lawyer in tow and file a wrongful termination lawsuit. One way that you can alleviate these fears is to have all outgoing employees sign a "release" where the employee agrees not to sue the employer in exchange for some benefit (such a severance package).