WASHINGTON TEACHER PLEADS WITH LEGISLATORS

Members of NAPTA continually contact legislators, media people and public officials, hoping to be heard. Unfortunately, our pleas seem to fall on deaf ears. How is it possible that those in power do not care about our schools, our teachers and most of all our children? This email was sent nearly a month ago and nothing has changed. NAPTA

Subj: Request for legislators to investigate corruption in education
Date: 3/11/2004 2:20:41 AM Central Standard Time
From: mjeanell@earthlink.net
To: ormsby_ti@leg.wa.gov , wood_al@leg.wa.gov , mcdonald_jo@leg.wa.gov , santos_sh@leg.wa.gov , rockefel_ph@leg.wa.gov , mcmahan_lo@leg.wa.gov , hunter_ro@leg.wa.gov , haigh_ka@leg.wa.gov , cox_do@leg.wa.gov , anderson_gl@leg.wa.gov , tom_ro@leg.wa.gov , talcott_gi@leg.wa.gov , mcdermot_jo@leg.wa.gov <, quall_da@leg.wa.gov , brown_li@leg.wa.gov , murray_br@leg.wa.gov , schmidt_da@leg.wa.gov , rasmusse_ma@leg.wa.gov , pflug_ch@leg.wa.gov , eide_tr@leg.wa.gov , carlson_do@leg.wa.gov , kohl_je@leg.wa.gov , benton_do@leg.wa.gov , mcauliff_ro@leg.wa.gov , finkbein_bi@leg.wa.gov , johnson_st@leg.wa.gov CC: mcdarlene@hubwest.com , teacherkh@aol.com Sent from the Internet (Details)

Dear Legislators:

First may I thank you and your legislative assistants for your assistance and information during my visit to the legislature two weeks ago. I regret that I was unable to introduce myself to you all personally. I thank Chairman Johnson and Chairman Quall for allowing me to testify before your respective education committees and listening to my requests for future action way beyond the bills under consideration. I also thank you for receiving, and, hopefully, reading and/or filing the documentation that I have been sending you concerning the irregularities and misconduct in the investigation, discipline, and appeal of complaints against teachers filed with the OSPI and the continuing lack of due process in my appeal of the unjust revocation of my teaching certificate currently before the State Board of Education.

I especially congratulate those of you who reacted so quickly to the Seattle Times articles on sexually abusive coaches, introducing bills to address the problem, and you all on the subsequent passage of the “coach” bills. I was very grateful that the media finally had the courage to begin to say publicly what I have been attempting to expose for the last nine years. As I wrote and told those of you on the education committees, the paper’s expose was only the “tip of the iceberg” of what I now deem the corruption in education, clearly very well developed in our state. For the sake of our children and for those of us teachers who are truly dedicated to providing them the education we have promised them, even at our own peril, I respectfully urge you to have the political and moral courage to continue to investigate the problem as I have suggested in my documentation. I also respectfully request that it will have priority for your interim meetings. I, and other targeted teachers, are very willing to assist you in any way that we can.

I also urge you to read Breaking the Silence, Overcoming the Problem of Principal Mistreatment of Teachers, Blase and Blase, Corwin Press, Inc., 2003, for a very well documented study, revealing that the problem is nation wide.

Perhaps it would be helpful if I shared the following note I wrote to other members of the National Association for the Prevention of Teacher Abuse, www.endteacherabuse.org, expressing my anguish after reading a very powerful article.

Cohorts:

I just reviewed the article: A False Accusation, And a Fateful Decision
Devoted Va. Teacher Couldn't Endure Sullied Reputation
By Timothy Dwyer
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 12, 2004; Page B01

which detailed the effect of a false accusation on a long-term, excellent teacher. Despite his stellar record he was removed from his classroom and investigated, protesting his innocence. Eventually, he could not tolerate the undeserved ignominy and jumped off a bridge.

For those of us who have been falsely accused, is this enough? To be so unjustly assaulted is so difficult that most of us have been comatose on the sofa. After all, doesn't everyone know how difficult it is to fire a teacher? This outstanding teacher was cleared, a very rare occurrence, and didn't know it. He's dead.

Most of us somehow lived through the accusations, but the betrayal by all of those who had a duty toward us; the counselors in our schools, the administrators, the superintendents, the school boards; then the union and its lawyers, the school district lawyers, the "hired gun" expert witnesses, the colleagues willing or forced to commit perjury (obviously having been informed, probably by the school district lawyer, that they would not be held accountable); then the judges; administrative hearing, superior court review, appellate court review; the refusal of police and other local law enforcement agencies to investigate charges of incontrovertibly documented perjury and other criminal complaints that we file; and finally the state agencies, the office of the state superintendent of public instruction, the office of administrative hearings, and the state board of education was even more shattering.

Most of the accused were destroyed and quit early on, their lives forever impaired. Somehow, a few of us, knowing that we were innocent and excellent teachers, persevered. The more egregious and blatant the actions levied against us became, the more resolved and strengthened we became. What began simply as an effort to secure the right to teach ethically, compassionately, and professionally, in the best interests of our students, became an effort to expose the politicizing of education, and now has become the exposure of the corruption of the education bureaucracy, more determined to protect itself (read, Enron) than to accomplish its primary duty, to educate children, our future citizens.

All the power of the billions spent on education is determined to diminish and silence us, but we have come together and our numbers are growing daily. We encourage one another as we hear story after story of evil levied against teachers and their deep fear of being destroyed, necessitating secrecy.

Some newspapers have printed story after story about false allegations and school shootings. The Seattle Times courageously exposed “Coaches who prey: the abuse of girls and the system that allows it,” trusting that there would be appropriate public outrage and legislative attention, having committed far more resources than most papers today. Others refuse to acknowledge the possibility and contribute their own spin, all to the detriment of teachers and students. Reporters have skirted all around the expose of the corruption in education that we’re asking them to write. How much more must we document and newspapers print?

We shall overcome.

Jeanell

This evening I read an article from the Washington Post online that revealed how extensive the sexual abuse of women in the service is, the additional abuse when they attempted to report that abuse, and the cover-up of it all, first at the Air Force Academy, and now in the entire armed forces, to the extent that Generals committed perjury before a Senate committee. We all are now familiar with the charges of abuse and cover-up within the Catholic Church, my church. I assert that the revelation of how teachers, especially those who dissent against their superiors on behalf of children, have been harassed, intimidated, coerced, and ultimately politically assassinated, and its ultimate detrimental effect on the children and the educational process will expand exponentially. You have taken the first step in acknowledgment and solution.

Legislators, I respectfully request that in order to reduce school violence, allow comprehensive and effective school reform, and improve the recruitment and retention of quality teachers, you address and remove the corruption in education in our state, leading the way for other states to follow, all for the sake of our children, our future citizens, and ultimately, our country.

Please cure this cancer as only you can do in our state.

Respectfully,
M. Jeanell Malone
2804 E. 14th Ave.
Spokane, WA 99202
(509) 535-9279

--- M. Jeanell Malone
--- mjeanell@earthlink.net

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