After decades of lax treatment of teachers who molest children or commit other serious crimes, the Los Angeles School Board is finally ready to take action — well, to think about taking action.
What the school board did Tuesday night was to water down a proposal to move quickly to get rid of criminal teachers and then approve forming a task force headed by Occidental College President Ted Mitchell to study possible changes in state laws and presumably union contracts.
Even then, the mealy-mouthed action barely passed on a 4-3 vote.
I know It’s hard to believe that dozens of cases of molestation by teachers have been exposed over the years, cases in which district officials with a wink and a nod looked the other way, transferred the offender or shifter them to a desk job where they sat around doing nothing for ages.
Jason Song in the Times produced a terrific series of articles last month entitled “Failure Gets a Pass” that told the story of the roughly 160 teachers and other LAUSD employees who are paid to do nothing — people whose competence is questioned or have run afoul of the law. They are paid about $10 million a year.
One article specifically dealt with molesters, citing the case of teacher’s aide Ricardo Guevara, who is now serving 15 years in prison and whose sexual abuse of three young adolescent girls led a jury to award $1.6 million in damages against LAUSD.
“But there was something the jury — and the public — was never told:
This was the third set of accusations that Guevara had molested
students,” Song wrote. “Twice before, when law enforcement officials had decided they
lacked the evidence to win a criminal conviction, L.A. Unified
officials had quietly put him back in the classroom.”
LAUSD policy and state law require protecting students first and foremost yet the practice is that “the district has erred on the side of protecting its staff,” the Times said.
The Guevara case is hardly an isolated example.
Yet, School Board President Marlene Canter has twice had to withdraw proposals to take actively lobby for legislation to be able to fire teachers who shouldn’t be within 1,000 feet of a classroom but in the end had to settle for nothing more than a study committee looking only at teachers accused or egregious or immoral acts.
“It’s very difficult to bring up the topic of dismissal without people feeling very protective,” Canter said.
Think about it: If unions and school board members are opposed to firing incompetent teachers, criminal teachers, molester teachers, is it any wonder LAUSD has failed for three decades to serve parents and students?
Like City Hall, LAUSD is a jobs program, not a service program. The people who pay the bills count for nothing. What matters is the people who get the paychecks.
“Like City Hall, LAUSD is a jobs program, not a service program. The people who pay the bills count for nothing. What matters is the people who get the paychecks.”
Ron, you said a mouthful. I think this kind of activity is common in schools, city hall, street care, pot hole repair. etc., etc., and when greed set in, that is when we started to be short of money,
Time for a change – for the better. I wish I could go to the Saturday meeting, but I promised to go to the Calabasas meeting. )Sigh)
TH
Ron,
It’s nice to grip and whine and write articles but to be effective against the City Establishment you need lawyers and lawsuits. This is the only effective way to get government’s attention. A non-profit organization can sue a government agency, and if they win they can recover all lawsuit costs plus a risk value dollar amount. Then, the winning lawsuit can force the government to act in a prescribed manner, according to the judge’s ruling.
Back when I was in High School, I had this math teacher that gave us way too much homework. We feared and hated the guy, and we would have falsely accused him of anything if we thought there was a chance of getting him off our backs.
there is NO WAY comment 3:39 was from a parent. We should not start from the assumption that our children are lying if they accuse a teacher of being a child molester. that is outrageous. an accusation like that may not (and should not) alone be enough to put someone behind bars, but it’s crazy to think that it’s not enough to get someone out of the classroom and away from OUR KIDS.
What else can we expect from a bunch of adults who were educated by LAUSD where nothing is taught and nothing is learned. This one is a no-brainer. Instant suspension until the suspicions are resolved.
these annonymous teacher posts defending child molesters are truely amazing. even if they can’t embrace accountability for student performance, they should be able to embrace accountability for child molestation!!!!!
Speaking of education, there are two e’s in “committee.”
You’re welcome. : )
We live in a very weird world, don’t we? Girls and women are fair game for men, and then are accused of being prostitutes, whores, “asked for it” people. How innocent men can be accused of pedophilia is a big question. It is not their fault. OK. Men are innocent. It is their
nature. But so are the females they prey on.
Wild animals (like lions) seem to have figured
sex out. Our school system shuts its eyes. Men will be men.
Well, I think that nothing will change unless men themselves start thinking seriously about what is taking place. The rape victim could be your Mom, Sis, wife, daughter, granddaughter.
Whores? No. Victims? Yes.
Hello, anonymous at 7:38 pm, “We should not start from the assumption that our children are lying”. Are you saying then, that an accused teacher should be considered guilty until proven innocent? That’s not the way it works in this country. Get off the Teachers are Evil bandwagon led by Jason Song of the LA Times and volunteer a week in a public school classroom.
Please 3:39, the rest of the world deals with children every day-nurses, doctors, ice cream store owners–and don’t forget strict parents–they don’t have the type of ludicrous protections teachers have. I’m sorry “unionized” teachers have.
Ron put it quite well: if it takes this much effort to oust child molesters, how in god’s name can LAUSD oust an incompetent or abusive teacher? Or does the California Constitution provide the incompetent with lifetime employment at our expense?
But let me guess–”its for the children,” right?
I am frequently struck by the irony of teachers who claim to be teaching kids to help them succeed in a society based on meritocracy, yet whose unions do everything they possibly can to remove merit from teachers’ compensation criteria.
12:15, are you saying that you’d be perfectly happy with a teacher accused of child molestation teach YOU OWN CHILD??????
I am very suspicious of all these accusations of molestation by teachers. LAUSD has a poor track record of retaliation against vocal “whistleblowing” teachers, and accusing someone of molestation is probably considered the easiest way to get rid of a troublesome teacher who is only fighting to improve the school or the system.