蜜桃影视

It began innocently. The sixth-grader stayed after school to help his teacher with small tasks. Eventually they ate lunch everyday in her classroom, and he began walking her home. One day in December, he later testified, she invited him to her apartment, where she offered marijuana and money and then performed oral sex and had intercourse with him.

He was 12, a student in her English class. He said their sexual relationship continued through his middle school years. Sometimes, they met at a motel located half a mile from school, where she would book a room for four hours. They drank vodka, he said, and she bought him presents: a phone, clothes, jewelry. Records show they texted or called each other more than 8,000 times.

Highlights of his testimony were included in a 2015 decision by an arbitrator terminating the teacher, Claudia Tillery, a 19-year veteran at Middle School 35 in Brooklyn鈥檚 Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood. Tillery had been acquitted in a criminal trial and contested the arbitrator鈥檚 right to fire her, but an appellate judge upheld the decision based on Tillery鈥檚 own admissions confirming 鈥渁 long history of furtive conduct unbecoming of an educator of children.鈥�

gives tenured educators like Tillery the right to contest charges the city has leveled against them in front of an arbitrator. Her ruling was among 154 decisions handed down between January 2015 and April 2016 that 蜜桃影视 obtained under New York鈥檚 Freedom of Information Law. The city education department also provided overall disciplinary figures, at 蜜桃影视鈥檚 request, for the school years between 2012-13 and 2015-16.

The agency, which has been widely criticized for failing to respond to public information requests in a timely fashion, provided all the documents in August, 28 months after 蜜桃影视 first requested them. It extended its initial deadline more than two dozen times.

Seventy teachers, three principals, and one school secretary were cited for misconduct on charges ranging from physical and verbal abuse to cheating, forgery, and theft. Some committed non-school-related crimes that included persistent shoplifting and what authorities called “one of the nation鈥檚 largest and longest-running鈥� tax fraud schemes.

Eighty were prosecuted by lawyers in the DOE鈥檚 Teacher Performance Unit, which targets chronic ineffectiveness in the classroom.

A total of 75 were dismissed, 23 of them for misconduct.

The cases represent a tiny fraction of the city鈥檚 58,000 teachers with tenure. Critics say tenure protections in state law make it prohibitively expensive and laborious to root out all but the most egregiously defective teachers.

Union supporters say the results show that most teachers are dedicated to serving children, typically resign to avoid being fired, and need to be protected from capricious administrators.

Tillery鈥檚 lurid case was of the decisions during this period, but disturbing narratives of teacher behavior are captured in many of these cases, retold by students and administrators from the often high-poverty schools where the teachers worked. The incidents occurred in small struggling elementary schools and in sprawling high schools with thousands of students.

Teachers were fired for choking students, knocking them down, flipping them over, and throwing books at them. A 29-year veteran was discharged after mocking a student with disabilities who couldn鈥檛 read a classmate鈥檚 shirt. A Washington Heights elementary school teacher was fined for making a student wash his mouth out with soap. At Brooklyn鈥檚 Clara Barton High School, a longtime English teacher required students to bring mints to use when nauseated and aspirin to prevent trips to the nurse.

A math teacher at Urban Science Academy, a Bronx school the DOE decided to close, used 鈥渃ounterfeit documents manufactured as part of a fraudulent scam鈥� to become chair of the department. An arbitrator fined an Inwood teacher $3,200 for working a second job 鈥� the employer鈥檚 name was redacted 鈥� during the school day; her principal argued on her behalf. The career of an art teacher ended after supervisors learned that he visited pornography sites like 鈥淧otbellied Goddesses鈥� in his classroom 鈥� apparently when students were not around 鈥� and downloaded 鈥渘umerous鈥� explicit images.

Oblivious to student well-being

The bond between Tillery and her student frayed in eighth grade. When she stopped sending presents, he stole her daughter鈥檚 laptop and camera. He told the arbitrator that 鈥渢he whole entire school knew鈥� about their relationship and students teased him, 鈥淗ow was sex with Ms. Tillery?鈥�

Tillery did not admit wrongdoing, claiming that the student was needy and had been manipulating her. 鈥淚n her view, she is the sole victim in this case,鈥� the arbitrator wrote, saying it 鈥渟erves to demonstrate why termination of her employment is the only appropriate penalty in this case.鈥� (The decision also noted that the case created adverse publicity and eroded trust in city schools, which was a factor in a handful of other high-profile misconduct cases.)

Accused teachers often seemed deaf to the well-being of students. A Brooklyn middle school teacher named Dyonne Gordon called students 鈥渂oti boy,鈥� a homophobic Jamaican slur, and referred to one as a 鈥渘*gger motherf**ker.鈥� A teacher who speaks that way to a student 鈥渉as crossed a line,鈥� the arbitrator ruled, discounting Gordon鈥檚 request for 鈥渃orrective鈥� discipline 鈥� a less severe penalty.

鈥淗aving crossed it, the Respondent aggravated the offense by denying it,鈥� said the arbitrator. 鈥淎ccording to her, the students made it all up, the principal was a liar, the school secretary was a liar, the investigator was incompetent, and the paraprofessionals were spies.鈥�

Across the borough, at 4,500-student Fort Hamilton High School, a global history teacher named James Cullen told a student he was going to 鈥渇**k her mother鈥� and said to another he looked at her 鈥渂ecause I like staring at ugly things.鈥�

He called students Hitler, Fishhook Mouth, Barbie, the Arab, Fat Man, and Bitch, and directed students to buy him food, saying, 鈥済o get me f**king snacks.鈥� He promised higher grades to those who did.

DOE lawyers argued that Cullen was 鈥渓ike a bully鈥� in his own classroom, with 鈥渉is ninth-grade students the target of his harassment.鈥� After several students complained, Cullen expressed remorse but said he had been trying to get close to students.

He appeared to be liked by a number of students, as even extremely ineffective teachers in these cases sometimes were.

鈥淢r Cullen is definetly [sic] one of the coolest teachers i’ve ever had but he doesn’t teach a single thing,鈥漮ne said on a .

Teachers under fire see conspiracies

The demise of educators brought up on incompetence charges more closely resembled failure in other white-collar industries. The performance of routine duties became erratic as teachers fell out with principals and colleagues. Deadlines were blown; absences became frequent and were usually ascribed to health issues. When charges were brought, the teacher described being the target of a plot by school administrators.

An arbitrator summed up one teacher鈥檚 view: 鈥淧rincipal Pedraja was some sort of vindictive puppet master that poisoned every subsequent administrator to view him negatively as part of a conspiracy theory because he had expressed dissatisfaction with a color-coding policy and choice of science textbooks.鈥�

In another color-themed conflict, a business teacher at the High School for Fashion Industries claimed the principal鈥檚 use of red ink in commenting on her lesson plans constituted 鈥渁 form of harassment.鈥�

In other cases, a Latin teacher at Bayside High School in Queens refused to submit mandatory lesson plans because he disliked the required format, a decision the arbitrator called 鈥渨orkplace suicide.鈥� He was terminated, as was a sinking Bronx instructor who, after negative evaluations, slammed her head against a file cabinet and smashed a desk to get her class鈥檚 attention.

Anger may have deepened into illness for an instructor of 5- and 6-year-olds at a Harlem school. Her failure to plan, teach standards, or assess learning left her class falling behind its peers.

She neglected to fill out report cards and failed to complete learning programs for her disabled students. A student went missing during dismissal (the principal found him 鈥渂eing berated by another student鈥檚 babysitter鈥�). She refused the school鈥檚 help 鈥� a fact weighed heavily by arbitrators 鈥� and sometimes returned home shortly after punching in.

During her hearing, she maintained that a 鈥渉ostile work environment鈥� at the school had made her ill 鈥� a claim echoed by other teachers who found themselves in a professional free fall. The arbitrator did not question the claim but found that 鈥渟he was unable to provide a valid educational experience to her students.鈥�

Disclosure: David Cantor served as the Department of Education鈥檚 press secretary under Mayor Michael Bloomberg from 2005 to 2010.

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