Superintendent
Arlene Ackerman
Larry Platt
Philadelphia Daily News Editor
Dear Editor Platt:
I am a freelance columnist and community activist who worked very closely with one of your most recently fired columnists, Jerome Maida. And I am writing to express my opposition to your own “jump-started out-rage” statements made in the Philadelphia Daily News column called “From The Editor,” which was made public on Tuesday, March 8, 2011. While I was encouraged that the column was bipartisan, I was disappointed in your “Giving a bleep about the audacity of Hope” opinion piece pertaining to “Hope Moffett: Soon to-be ex-teacher … future columnist?” And I was very disappointed in your opinion piece pertaining to “Superintendent Arlene Ackerman’s plan to convert Audenried High into a charter school run by Kenny Gamble.”
Contrary to the editor’s contention, as you wrote: the teacher “Hope Moffett stumbled onto a teachable moment." So it is that, as this drama has unfolded, a no-tenured high school teacher has exposed the Nixonian bent of Queen Arlene and her Haldeman-like apparatchiks, a couple of bureaucrats named Linda Cliatt-Wayman and Andrew Rosen,” I believe the facts are that Hope Moffett was not fired because of Arlene Ackerman’s plan but rather because of her insubordination to school district of Philadelphia operations and community. Larry, I’m really in disagreement with your view that “this gutsy teacher,” as you called Hope Moffett, is “more committed to teaching kids than a superintendent intent on quelling dissent.”
Superintendent Ackerman, principals, and others who are empowered with greater administrative powers, are the best recipe for success in education given its overseer and executive authority identity. The Philadelphia Daily News should support this course because it is consistent with its local interest of ensuring a stable and safe Philadelphia that can counter youth rebellion in the region, and also because it is the form of authority approved in Philadelphia’s own school district of Philadelphia policies; a policy for which 1,126,768 registered voters in Philadelphia voted. In 2010 the city of Philadelphia political authority voted to retain Superintendent Ackerman.
I also disagree with your view that “Ackerman can trample Hope Moffett’s right because she knows that public despair – in the alphabet-soup age of PHA, DRPA, BRT and DROP – is so damned possible, which suggests that the operation and management of Ackerman’s leadership in Philadelphia and the development of teaching in this region by the superintendent are not compatible with local honest politicians and community activists. In fact, as a former school district employee who was fired over 8 years ago, standing up for what I felt was the right thing to do, for insubordination just like Moffett was fired for standing up for what she felt was the right thing to do, I support the hearing decision to terminate. Because I hope you can agree that the school district must protect the students from being in sympathy with any teacher’s personal beliefs. Ackerman is this kind of superintendent in my view.
Complete central teacher control of Ackerman’s students is a recipe for disaster, as the city’s history has made abundantly clear. The new superintendent must have the necessary checks and balances that will prevent the return to power of an unsafe teacher. You must agree with me that any teacher deliberately giving students anything for the intent to go on foot or public transportation, etc, to a non-school sanctioned activity is unsafe regardless of good intentions of studying the civil-rights movement or not.
I strongly believe that the provision pertaining to firing teachers in Philadelphia School District permanent policies provides the best mechanism and time frame to implement a fair solution to this unsafe teacher problem. Any delay in the implementation of this policy, as the school hearing report calls for, will undermine Philadelphia’s political process and will not lead to stability but, rather, will further exacerbate the tension and youth violence that exists in the City. I hope you concur that the Philadelphia Daily News and its editors should support the school district process outlined in school district of Philadelphia policies.
As a regular reader and supporter of fair reporting at the DN, I hope that I can receive your support on these issues in Philadelphia. (By-the-way, it's within my interest sphere to write about these important subjects, and it would be great if you could offer me a regular column about the superintendent, school board union, civil-rights, and the teachers. I think it would only be fair to have this opportunity since John Baer, DN columnist, can vouch for my interest in news reporting).
Throughout your career, I believe you have been committed to civil rights. I hope you take my comments in that context. And to be honest, I hope that you will consider the thought of being outraged about how a pitch for a new column written by myself and Jerome Maida was not saved so that the Daily News readers can get another sexy view of what really goes on socially and politically in Philly. I was hoping that the Daily News editors would protect the hard fought gains Jerome Maida Comics Guy and I, a well known news analyst of the city’s top stories, a former community newspaper staffer, have achieved with DN help over the years.
Would you consider to at least print some, most, or all, of this letter about my views? As a well-known community activist and political analyst I'd like the DN readers to learn that I made the point that it was correct for the teacher to be fired. And I would like them to know that the DN editor such as yourself will print an opposing dialogue from activists, politicians, and even religious leaders with a view to reaching an amicable agreement.
I also want the readers to know that there are those who believe that what the teacher did had nothing to do with civil rights issues or superintendent Ackerman.
Your consideration to go online and research Van Stone Downing and Jerome Maida in the Daily News as recommended above will go a long way in defending civil rights in Philadelphia and in promoting the Philadelphia Daily News community leader's interests in the region.
Sincerely yours,
Van Stone Downing
vspfoundation@yahoo.com
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