As governor contemplates teacher 'discipline' bill, fresh classroom outrage

As Gov. Jerry Brown weighs whether to sign a teacher-discipline bill that actually makes it more difficult to discipline teachers, fresh evidence turns up of bad teacher behavior in the state's largest school district, the district where the outrages occurred that forced the Legislature to focus on teacher behavior:

“An audio clip of a high school English teacher repeatedly dropping the F-bomb during a classroom outburst has gone viral on the campus of Narbonne High in Harbor City.

“In the clip, which was recorded by a student on Sept. 26, the teacher yells 'I know my f–ing s–t. Don’t f— with that. I’m tired of trying to educate you, and you guys resist every step of the f—ing way. Get the f— out of here.' (Listen to the audio clip).

“The outburst occurred in the classroom of a fledgling new school for performing arts that is located on the campus of Narbonne High. Called Humanities and Art Academy — or HArts Academy for short — the school officially broke away from the comprehensive high school this fall.”

Foul-mouthed teacher no longer 'feels safe' with her students

But the weird twist is that even though the story is headlined “LAUSD teacher placed on leave after profanity-laden outburst is recorded by student,” and even though it starts out conveying the sense that this is just outrageous behavior,  Los Angeles Newspaper Group reporter Rob Kuznia sympathizes with the teacher and depicts her as the victim!

“The HArts Academy teacher did point out that the girl who recorded the outburst broke school rules just by having her cellphone on in class. Indeed, LAUSD policy prohibits the use of cellphones during class time. …

“'I’ve always felt safe with my students,' said the teacher, who attended Narbonne herself. 'That’s why it hurts so much that someone would do this.'”

Here's hoping Brown shows some spine and vetoes the bogus teacher discipline bill. How is it bogus? I defer to Richard A. Carranza, superintendent of the San Francisco Unified School District.

“AB375 would restrict the ability of our district to gather evidence during the dismissal process, add procedural hurdles to the immediate suspensions of employees when serious misconduct with children is alleged, make it more difficult to amend charges if new information is uncovered during investigations, and create unworkable timelines for new processes and procedures while severely limiting the authority of the administrative law judge to alter those timelines when necessary. While I support the initial goal of the bill to streamline the procedure for teacher dismissal and make it more cost-effective, the technical flaws in the bill produce the opposite result.

“For this reason, I am not aware of any district superintendent or human resources director who supports AB375.”

If AB375 is enacted, that should be the death knell for the narrative about Jerry Brown the genius gov. He'll have revealed himself as just another Dem lawmaker who cares more about the CTA than the state of California's greater good.