Do Inadequate Laws Hamper Educrats
From Dealing with Cheats and Nitwits?
 
By Henry J. Stern
March 29, 2005

Two unusual incidents in the last week involving the city's Department of Education have received attention and aroused concern.
 
Both are fairly straightforward occasions of dishonesty or stupidity by relatively lower-level employees.  They do not involve disputes over educational theory, and there has been no political intervention in either case.
 
The first situation is described in detail in the civil service weekly, The Chief, in a page one article by Gina Salomone.  The headline: "Union: A Diversion.  KLEIN RIPS UFT ON TEACHER TEST SCAM."
 
A relatively young black teacher, Wayne A. Brightly, who could not pass the certification test needed to receive a permanent appointment, hired his tutor, Rubin Leitner, an elderly white man suffering from Asperger's syndrome, to take the required examination in his place.  He allegedly paid $2 for this service.  An accomplice attached Leitner's picture to Brightly's name to create a phony ID.  The scheme unraveled when Leitner scored so high on the exam that, compared with Brightly's previous scores, the difference was inexplicable.  That is what happens when you engage Rainman.
 
The practice of hiring someone to take a test for you is not at all new.  A public figure did it once as an undergraduate at a fine college.  Since the incident occurred over a half-century ago, we should not identify the characters.  At the time, the student had to leave the college.  He returned after military service, and went on to great success.

Substitutes sometimes take civil service exams, college tests and entrance examinations for others.  Sometimes they are caught, and in other cases the scheme succeeds.  We do not know how many times it has worked, just as we do not know how many people have quietly paid bribes and been satisfied with the result.  These are called crimes of content, and generally there is no complainant.
 
In the Brightly case, the controversy is about what the Department of Education can do when the fraud is discovered.  Common sense would call for immediate action: either dismissal or a 30-day suspension without pay, during which legal proceedings could be carried out to terminate the teacher's employment. That is what would happen if such gross misconduct were found in most other city agencies under mayoral control.  If the employee is cleared or the charges are dropped, he gets back pay for the period of his suspension.  The process is governed by Sec. 75 of the Civil Service Law.
 
However, under Sec. 3020-A of the Education Law, a more elaborate procedure is required in the school system.  There are no suspensions without pay, except for the most egregious crimes.  In most cases; the agency can only take someone off the payroll after legal proceedings are completed.  The process can take from three months to three years, and the matter may well end up in third-party arbitration.  This is said to be provided in the lengthy and detailed contract the Department of Education signed with the United Federation of Teachers.  Although the contract has expired, its terms are still in effect.
 
The union responds that it is the Department of Education's fault for allowing the ringer to take the test.  Leitner does not resemble Wayne Brightly at all, but his picture was posted above Brightly's name.  The test, by the way, was administered by the New York State Department of Education, not the city.
 
Randi Weingarten, president of the UFT, said that the Department of Education could complete Mr. Brightly's hearing within three months.  "During that time," she told the Chief, "they potentially could take Mr. Brightly off the payroll."  If in fact the agency had that power, there is not much to argue about.  We believe they should exercise it.  But Department of Education counsel Michael Best denies that the agency has the authority to suspend without pay in this fact-situation.  Mr. Brightly not having been accused of a violent crime, sexual misconduct or drug abuse.
 
In this case, we believe that Mr. Brightly's dismissal is warranted.  The cheating aspect — soliciting and possibly coercing an elderly man into impersonation — may even warrant criminal prosecution.  In addition, a person who cannot pass a test to be a teacher should not teach.
 
The second incident deals with the answers to a mathematics exam, as reported by Susan Saulny in "Wrong, Wrong and Wrong: Math Guides Are Recalled," in Friday's Times.
 
Somehow, a completely erroneous set of answers for a fourth grade test in mathematics was sent by Tweed to the schools.  In addition to numerous mistakes in computation, "Fourth" (as in grade) was misspelled "Forth."
 
The Department of Education blamed the fiasco on one of its employees, who was responsible for producing the test.  But, clearly, either the answers were not checked by the educrats at Tweed, or the answers were performed by an employee who is so mathematically challenged that he could not answer questions designed for a nine year old.
 
In either case, it is more comic than tragic, an error that is particularly embarrassing, seized upon by the press and the union, and lamented by friends of the agency and its efforts.
 
If this blunder had taken place in a private company, heads would roll.  But since it happened at the Department of Education, similar in a way to La La Land, the only result of this snafu is that a letter of reprimand will be placed in the personnel file of an employee whose identity has been concealed, lest he or she be outed as a dunce.
 
If the mistake had been made by a supplier, the company would have been named, and Department of Education would have a strong case for damages, having been subjected to public humiliation and ridicule as a result of the supplier's error.  But the supplier would have to have included key answers to the questions.  When I was a child, the teacher's edition of a textbook always had the solutions to the math problems in the back of the book.  I can't believe this sensible practice is out of fashion.
 
There are four possibilities:  1) Nobody ever checked the answers.  2) Nobody knew the answers were supposed to be checked.  3) The checker was so stupid that he/she could not do fourth grade math. 4) The test was given to a child to check and he/she was not good at math.  5) Any combination of the above.
 
It is difficult to believe that a reputable supplier would publish an exam with so many errors.  The company would have its own reputation as a business to protect, as well as its relations with their client.
 
There is more to this story than has been published so far.  We call for full disclosure by the Department of Education.  How can they be trusted as testers if they don't check their own work?
 
The other oddity is that the penalty for this apparent gross incompetence is simply a letter of reprimand in one's personnel file, which doesn't cost an employee five cents.  If such numerous and ridiculous mistakes were made by Education employees, the penalty should be much more serious: if not dismissal, a substantial fine, suspension, demotion or transfer to a much less responsible position.  It is also wrong to scapegoat one individual, however lightly, for an error in oversight or computation which was in all likelihood made by a number of people, unless the department relied on only one person, which was a great managerial error.
 
Why are we so concerned about a situation of ineptitude which has such comic aspects?  It is because many people are concerned that what happened here is symptomatic of a certain lightness in other areas of the department's work.  How can people lead children to excellence if they can't do fourth grade math?
 
At least this bungle can't be blamed on the UFT, unless the errors were made by UFT members who are relatively immune from punishment.  That could happen if the disciplinary process that Tweed would be required to enter into would reveal more dirty linen than anyone wants to hang out to dry.
 
These two incidents are not the fault of Chancellor Joel Klein.  If anything, they reveal the difficulty of the task he has undertaken.  But he should take the most vigorous action he can in both cases. He has no duty to protect the cheats and nitwits who have brought shame on the efforts of dedicated people.
 
Most New Yorkers, including us, are rooting for the success of the school system.  Why do they make it so difficult for us to hold the torch?

---