NYC Public Schools Pay $35 million per Year for Nothing
11:38 am By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo · Bizarro| Controversia| Education| Labor| New York| New York City| radio
11 Mar 2009I was dumbstruck after listening to last week’s episode of Chicago Public Radio’s This American Life program this morning. The episode featured a story so Kafkaesque I first doubted its veracity and then just sat shocked. It’s simple enough to sum up in just a few words: the New York City Public School system sends teachers who “misbehave” or are suspected of having done something wrong to what amounts to detention hall for teachers. Teachers are told they will be going to a “reassignment center” and when they arrive, wait to meet with district authorities.
But there will never be a meeting. The teachers sit in rooms for hours doing nothing. Those hours turn in to weeks. Weeks into months for most. And for some into a year or more than one year. Doing nothing.
A culture emerges within this confinement. It is reported by those who have been in what is called “the rubber room” – the informal name for the facility — that the overwhelming boredom and depression felt by the teachers translates into childlike behavior, violent fights and territorial squabbles. In effect, they become a lot like children in detention.
Teachers awaiting their fate — a decision by the NYC school system on whether they will be reinstated and return to teaching or terminated — continue to earn their full salary, even though they are doing absolutely nothing in the rubber room day in and day out. The estimated cost to NYC taxpayers? Some 35 million dollars per year.
Some teachers admit they’ve done something wrong. But many say they have no idea why they are in the rubber room nor why the school system would prefer children to go without teachers rather than clearing up whatever the problem was. To hear these teachers, it sounds like the rubber room has systematically destroyed their lives.
Have any of you ever heard stories like this or do you know of anyone who has? It seems almost too surreal to be true.
I highly recommend checking out the This American Life episode for yourself, where the download is free (this week only; the story is about 7 minutes in).
A group of filmmakers are also producing a film about the rubber room. Check out the trailer above and their website for more information.
Via / This American Life
- Tags: Education, NYC, public schools, rubber room, teachers
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3 Responses to NYC Public Schools Pay $35 million per Year for Nothing
Ed Weldon
March 15th, 2009 at 2:30 am
I listened to NPR this morning broadcasting what probably was the same American Life program about the Rubber Room. What struck me was the justification statements by both the Superintendent and a union official defending the process.
Their words of concern about the safety of children evoked images of the previous administration in Washington as they defended the prisoner detentions at Guantanamo Bay. And memories of Orwell’s 1984.
We were luckier than I thought when Mr Bloomberg washed out in the recent presidential primaries. His tolerance of this situation is a certain disqualifier for any serious political office to which he may aspire. Best he and the entire NYC DOE senior administrative staff begone, the sooner the better.
Ed Weldon
Jennifer Woodard Maderazo
March 15th, 2009 at 6:27 am
Exactly. The justification and the secretiveness are frightening. The word Kafkaesque really apply to this whole story. As a non-New Yorker, I am surprised that this goes on in the country’s most important city.
Joe T.
March 15th, 2009 at 8:30 pm
The reason for the existence of the Rubber Room is litigation. NYC is also full of lawyers, and during the 1970s, there was a heyday of litigation by both teachers and students against the public school system. Teachers’ salaries are considered a contractual right that cannot be abrogated, and the expense of litigating a termination is so high and the process so complicated that the school system has created the “Rubber Room” as an alternative to firing teachers. Likewise, even the slightest misbehavior on the part of a teacher, in connection with a student, can provoke aggressive lawsuits by students’ families. Students are often prodded into suing the school system for the slightest provocation by the same lawyers who litigate on behalf of teachers. This rights-obsessed and victim-obsessed litigation culture has resulted in everyone being afraid of their own shadows. Hence, the Rubber Room.
Only an Act of God, an Act of Congress, or an edict from the Mayor’s office could stop this madness, but don’t count on it, because it’s much easier to leave in place than to change things.