More and more of us are being exposed to cases of blundered investigations, both by school administrators and actual investigators. Retaliation and wrongful attacks on educators usually follow. As a former engineer, I take every situation and try to break it down. “Oh that bridge collapsed…well was tha failure in the beams, columns, cables, legs What caused that to happen” So now as I see a potential issue I try to analyze it section by section. I had the opportunity, as chapter leader, to be included in the beginning stages of something that was not right…corporal punishment of a student by an administrator. With that I present you the timeline of the Mike Bravo Experiment. See if you can see a pattern.
(note: the names are changed to protect the innocent)
Stage 1: Mike Bravo witnesses a student being dragged down the hall, against their will, by an administrator. He contacts me, fills me in and I send the following email to the Principal and the Office of Special Investigations (OSI), while he submits a witness statement.
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From: Francesco Portelos <fportelos@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Jan 11, 2013 at 8:21 AM
Subject: Employee pulling child against will
To: Linda Hill <LHill2@schools.nyc.gov>, OSI-Inquiries <OSI-Inquiries@schools.nyc.gov>, cdalton@schools.nyc.gov
Dear Ms. Hill,
— -Francesco Portelos
Good morning,
Please provide the name of the witness.
Thank you,
Christopher J. Dalton
Deputy Director
Office of Special Investigations
65 Court Street, Room 922
Brooklyn, NY 11201
Email: CDalton@schools.nyc.gov
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ARE YOU READY FOR THIS KEEP IN MIND THE RED TIME STAMPS ON THESE EMAILS.
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From: Francesco Portelos <fportelos@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Jan 11, 2013 at 4:16 PM
Subject: Re: Employee pulling child against will
To: Dalton Christopher <CDalton@schools.nyc.gov> Cc: Debra Penny <dpenny@uft.org>
Good afternoon,
Here are the big wigs of our CFN.
Dr Lavin’s CFN N 303 Kathy Lavin 718 642 5843
Network Leader Laura Kaiser 718 642 5757
Dir of Operations Assessment ELL Grants Iris Bernstein Battino 718 642 5708
Achievement Data/ITT Summer School Rhonda Sorger 718 642 5832
CEIS Rosalba Bimbiras 718 642 5710 Facilities Food and Nutrition Transportation
Lori Marino 718 348 2980 Attendance 311 Liaison C- 1(917) 846 2563 H-(718) 967-8737
Bambi Levine 718 348 2912
SpEd Support Health Nicole Mew 718 348 2991
Special Education Anothony Mitchell 718 348 2989
Youth Development Safety Suspension Shawn Thompson 718 642 5855
Human Resources Payroll Gloria Quinn 718 642 5840 Budget Fax 718 642 5710
Hubert Guscott 718 935 4794 Medical Manager – DOE Medical Donald Conyers
Dennis Boyles 718 935 3896 <————–
— Linda V. Hill Principal,
IS 49 tel. 718 727 6040
fax. 718 876 8207
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Want to take a guess as to how the investigation against the assistant principal will go I’m thinking the same way all the investigations against the administration have been going….nowhere.
I’ll keep you posted…
So far there has been no disciplinary action on Mike Bravo. My hats off to him. If we only had more educators who would stand up and fight for student rights.
UPDATE -03-18-13 Mike Bravo informed me that he received a disciplinary letter for his file today. In the letter it states that he did not allow a student to go to the bathroom. All the evidence shows that the student did not even ask to go to the bathroom, nor did they go to the bathroom on themselves Even if the allegations were true a non-disciplinary counseling memo would have sufficed. However, we are dealing with a retaliatory administration who lost the staff and is trying to keep them from speaking up.
Mike Bravo should know better than to do what is right, Doesn’t he know that those are the people who get harassed the most