Letter to the Editor: Madison Elementary School Teachers Call for Constructive Dialogue

As Madison Elementary teachers, we are gravely dismayed by the media’s failure to engage in a fair and in-depth reporting about what is happening at Madison Elementary School. The media and others have oversimplified facts and circumstances, reducing the analysis to one of teachers resisting change while providing a platform for District officials to justify their own years of systematic neglect and poor leadership of our School community. Sensationalizing the story with a few sound bites is inaccurate reporting.

The current predicament began when Superintendent, Dr. Brian McDonald, hired Juan Ruelas as Principal of the school without any input from parents, community and teachers. Despite the District’s current statement, this unilateral hiring process is uncommon as three schools, Willard, McKinley and Altadena, were allowed the “courtesy” of a Principal selection panel with parent and teacher representation. When Madison parents, teachers and community asked why Madison was treated differently, Dr. McDonald admitted last June that he “did not go through the usual process to appoint Mr. Ruelas,” but he thought that Mr. Ruelas was “the best possible candidate for Madison” and it was within his purview to make a unilateral decision. For those of us who had long fought for our Madison community, this unilateral hiring decision was just one more reflection of a larger historical pattern of neglecting the challenges our Madison School community has faced for years.

The reality for our students is that over 87% are English Language Learners. The reality for our Madison families is that over 90% of our students qualify for free or reduced lunch. The reality for our teachers is that K-3 class size is between 27 and 31students and 4-5 class size is 35 to 45, and we have no teacher assistants. Despite these statistics, we believe that all our children can achieve
educational success and put that belief into practice every day. However, a positive teacher attitude without fundamental, structural support will not lead to full success. So, for example, we have fought for a fully funded library (including a librarian), the elimination of long-term substitutes, and District funded language development resources — all of which have been denied to our site. We had to fight the District for improved play areas (blacktop) and better facilities management, and implemented and funded our own physical education program with community partners that also work with Sierra Madre Elementary. In fact, Principal Ruelas discontinued our “home grown” program and returned our school to the State-law mandated 5 minutes per period approach that didn’t work before.

The oversimplified view that we teachers are resisting change is at once false, an overstatement, ahistorical, and irresponsible. The Madison teacher community has worked through past changes and recognizes that any new site leadership likely will bring changes. But, how change is made is equally as important as the change itself. Communicating changes and even some idea about the bases for change always is critical to success. The new Principal neither communicated with teachers or parents about wholesale and sweeping changes. For example, two of our young children soiled themselves in the first week of school due to a unilateral change in restroom usage. As teachers, we could not even assist parents understand the basis for the new restroom rule as the Principal didn’t
explain it to us. The same was true for a lunchtime change that put our older students first up for their lunch and our younger students now almost an hour later. The lack of communication not only led to grumbling, it drove a division between teachers and parents. The current school climate fosters a false dilemma of the good versus the bad teacher, the deserving versus the undeserving parent, and has resulted in violating teachers’ rights, and creating a hostile environment for everyone.

As Madison teachers, we needed to voice these issues to avoid further marginalizing our school. A significant number of parents also expressed their discontent by walking out of the school on September 1st. We must honor the courage of parents and teachers whom despite the intimidation tactics and threats of retaliation have publicly denounced what we believe is unjust. We don’t intend
to harm any one, we just want to make the indignities and inequities at Madison visible to the community at large. All of this is necessary to protect the greater good: The well being and growth of the Madison School community.

At this point, the majority of teachers consider Principal Ruelas as a secondary issue in the big picture of how we all need to constructively address the many challenges of our school. Despite the District’s problematic hiring decision, the District’s current approach must graduate to a constructive one. Tasking someone with bringing order and “a lot of rules” to unruly people who need
“structure,” as Board member Scott Phelps stated in the Star News’ article, is both ridiculous and counterproductive. Such divisive rhetoric puts Principal Ruelas in a more difficult place than he already finds himself. At this point, Mr. Ruelas must play both a messiah and tyrant at the same time. Savior or not, Mr. Ruelas must treat the people with whom he must work with a basic sense of
dignity and respect. Taking keys from teachers, not letting students take bathroom breaks, unilaterally moving teachers’ classroom and damaging their property in the process, eliminating special physical education programs, closing the computer lab, cracking down on educators and parents who express their opinions about what is best for kids, and calling the police on teachers and
parents, will not address the challenges that Madison faces.

We teachers truly are dismayed at the current rhetoric and call for common sense leadership that brings people together. The current conditions limit our ability to fulfill our primary goal of preparing students for success. Let’s engage each other in a constructive dialogue where parents and teachers are treated as assets, not obstacles. As we identify areas of improvement, we teachers are
open to training and methodologies to improve our program. We care about the students, we come from this community, and some of us even attended Madison as kids. For us, Madison is one school and one community, and we need to build on this principle.

Segundo Belmar
Dolores Lopez
Kathleen Peralta
Jesús Gómez
Gilbert Ochoa
Kathie Goethel
José Guzmán
Fil Vargas
Tracy Gaestel
Patricia Guzmán
Monica Rosales

September 2nd, 2015