[MN] Black teacher: Administrators trying to fire me for criticizing race-based discipline rules
EAG News ^ | 5/28/15 | Steve Gunn
ST. PAUL, Minn. – It’s not unusual for authorities to try to silence those who speak the painful truth.
Aaron Benner, a veteran elementary teacher in the St. Paul school district, is a perfect example.
For more than three years, Benner has been calling out the district for what he believes are dangerously lax disciplinary policies, particularly involving black students.
He believes those policies are largely the result of the district’s contractual relationship with the Pacific Educational Group, a radical San Francisco-based consulting firm.
PEG pushes the idea that black students are victims of “white privilege” school policies that make it difficult or impossible for them to learn.
It also teaches that children of color are often unfairly punished for behaviors that are cultural in nature. The organization advises schools to keep problematic black students in the classroom, regardless of their behavior.
The result has been a lack of discipline and increasing chaos in the school district, according to Benner.
Benner doesn’t believe the district is doing black students any favors by teaching them that they are victims who have a right to misbehave without threat of consequence.
And he hasn’t been shy about sharing those thoughts with the school board and community.
But he’s been paying the price for his willingness to challenge district policies. He’s been reprimanded four times in the current school year, following 13 years of exemplary evaluations.
But now Benner believes there may be a silver lining. He said four school board members who rejected his protests are set to be replaced in the November election, because the dominant Democratic Farm Labor Party has withdrawn its support of them.
That means that four new members will likely be elected to the seven-member board, and will hopefully be more receptive to change.
“Every time I think I’m done with this district, fate throws me a bone,” said Benner, 46, who’s been teaching for 20 years, including 14 in the St. Paul district. “I think we were part of this and I am very proud of myself.”
Breaking the silence
Benner, like most St. Paul teachers, remained largely silent for years about the increasing lack of discipline in St. Paul schools.
But that all changed in December, 2011, after he read an editorial in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, noting the high percentage of black student suspensions in the St. Paul district, and putting the blame largely on teachers.
“It basically said that black kids were being suspended at a higher rate than other kids, and teachers need to do a better job,” Benner said. “I was very angry when I read that, and I went to a restaurant and wrote a reply.”
The newspaper published Benner’s response, and he said he received a lot of positive feedback from colleagues and others in the community. That inspired him to address the St. Paul school board later that month, regarding the same topic.
He also started talking to and meeting with a small group of fellow teachers from the district who agreed with him and wanted to help address the issues.
In December 2013 he published another letter, this time in response to an article in the St. Paul Pioneer Press that praised the role of PEG in the school district.
“Your recent story on St. Paul Public Schools and race failed to mention the elephant in the room,” he wrote. “That elephant is that St. Paul Public Schools currently has a black agenda, thanks to the Pacific Educational Group consulting firm.
“The agenda is to place blame on white teachers for low test scores and a high suspension rate among black boys. We never want to address parental involvement, lack of fathers in the homes or education not valued.
“We should be speaking with our black parents whose kids are doing well (and St. Paul has many that fit this criteria) and ask them what they do to ensure that their children succeed.
“I’d bet my last dollar that we’d learn that education is valued in these homes and parents are involved with their children’s education. This is not rocket science. Spending tons of money on this consulting firm is a slap in the face to the taxpayers of St. Paul.
“As a black man who currently teaches in St. Paul, PEG does not represent my views on how to close the achievement gap.”
Finally, in May of 2014, Benner and four colleagues addressed the school board. They were on the advance agenda, and word got out that they were going to be speaking out against the district’s “racial equity” policies and its association with PEG.
They were greeted by a packed house and lots of media coverage, and their words resounded throughout the community.
Benner began his remarks to the board by quoting Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s famous words about people being judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin.
“Here we are, 51 years later, and currently in our schools, lack of character is now being excused due to students’ skin color,” he said.
“I made a similar plea to this school board two and half years ago and I am here again because I believe we are crippling our black children by not holding them to the same expectations as other students.
” I am here because black students can and should behave in any classroom regardless of the race, gender or ethnicity of their teacher.
“Cussing out your teacher is not black culture. Refusing to do work is not black culture. Not following directions is not black culture. Hitting other students is not black culture. Assaulting teachers is not black culture.
“This school district needs to ask my community: What is black culture? And which behaviors will NOT be accepted in our schools. We must engage our parents and not be afraid of being called a racist. We all want to stop the school to prison pipeline. Character development must not be ignored.”
Paying the price for honesty
Unfortunately the majority of school board members rejected what Benner and the other teachers had to say. Nothing changed in the district in terms of student discipline, but a lot changed for Benner at work.
After years of teaching with excellent evaluations from administrators, he said he was suddenly targeted by the district. He has been officially reprimanded four times during the current school year for situations he doesn’t believe would have caused a stir in the past.
In one case he said he was reprimanded for contacting the parent of a student who was assaulted by another student, because the district said he shared confidential information with that parent.
In another case he was reprimanded for confronting a student about bullying another student, because he heard about the bullying from other kids in his class. The district said it was unprofessional to take the word of other children.
The third reprimand came when the district questioned the validity of a doctor’s excuse, after Benner called in sick on a day when he was supposed to meet with a principal, he said.
“She thought I was trying to avoid her,” Benner said.
He accepts responsibility for the fourth reprimand, because he was out of the classroom for about three minutes without his teaching assistant present, leaving students unsupervised.
Benner is convinced that all of the reprimands were the result of his open challenge to the district’s radical disciplinary policies and its connection with PEG.
“They have been making up lies for the past year,” he said. “I’ve been under four investigations. Each one had to do with confidentiality issues, or tried to paint me as an unfit teacher.
“After the second one, I let the superintendent know that they were not going to intimidate me, that I was going to keep speaking out because the school was going to hell.”
Benner is convinced that some other charge would have been leveled against him, and an effort would have been made to terminate his employment, if it weren’t for the March 2015 publication of a positive story about his crusade in a local publication called CityPages.
“It finally took a blogger, Susan Yu, to do a story about me to get them to leave me alone,” he said.
While the current school year has obviously been very stressful for Benner, there is apparently light at the end of the tunnel.
Last month, four St. Paul school board members who openly rejected the claims made by Benner and his four colleagues failed to gain the endorsement of the local Democratic Farm Labor Party for re-election in November.
That means they will probably be replaced by four new board members who will hopefully take a different approach to student discipline in the district, Benner said.
An article published by the Minneapolis Star Tribune does not directly credit Benner or the other teachers who spoke out, but confirms that the lack of discipline and safety in schools was a major concern of DFL party officials and many citizens.
“Something good came out of this,” Benner said. “People heard us speaking and said ‘What the hell is going on?”
Benner said he will continue to speak out, because the mission has not been accomplished.
“My big goal is to get PEG out and stop paying for that consulting firm,” he said. “I want people to know how damaging it has been for black children.” |
