Mayor Bill de Blasio’s school officials are firing fewer of the teachers they deem unfit to work with kids.
The city Department of Education brought charges of misconduct or incompetence against 237 tenured educators during the state’s last fiscal year — down 47% from 443 in 2012-13, the last full year under former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, state data show. The number fired by hearing officers after administrative trials fell from 56 to 15.
In the latest tally, just 6% of the teachers charged got the ax. That’s down from 13% in 2012-13.
Most accused educators, instead, are slapped with fines, suspensions and reprimands and return to the classroom. Many others “settle” charges by admitting some wrongdoing and paying a fine to keep their jobs, if only to work in a pool of substitutes.
Among recent cases, Steven Guzzi, a veteran teacher at Thomas Edison Career and Technical High School, “creeped out” a 16-year-old student, who testified he leaned over her desk during a lesson on social media and asked if she had posted photos of herself in the bathroom or on the beach. He told her she was pretty and he liked to be around her. Guzzi didn’t object when classmates teased that he was her “boyfriend.”
Guzzi denied any sleaziness, but admitted his silence was a “bad call.”
Hearing officer Michael Lazan found “serious misconduct” but that it did not merit firing Guzzi, a teacher for 21 years. He suspended Guzzi for 90 days without pay and warned him not to repeat the bad behavior.
Glisenia Franco, a teacher at PS 91 in the Bronx, allegedly ordered students to stand in the back of the classroom facing the wall. When one asked for assistance, she replied, “You should get a little bottle and wear diapers.”
Franco refuted the charges of verbal abuse, saying the DOE failed to bring the students in to testify. Hearing officer Sarah Miller Espinosa found the DOE had proven its case, but only fined Franco $5,000.
Mona Davids, lead plaintiff in an ongoing lawsuit seeking to overhaul the teacher disciplinary system, said parents need independent arbitrators, not those chosen jointly by the DOE and teachers’ union.
“We feel the laws are written to protect teachers, not children,” she said.
DOE spokeswoman Danielle Filson had no explanation for the worsening track record on termination trials, but said the city gets rid of scores of ineffective or abusive teachers by prodding them to resign or retire.
The city employs about 79,000 teachers.
