don't smile--you're on candid camera

I remember reading about the Everett EA's accusation that Cascade High School officials had been secretly videotaping a journalism teacher with a crudely hidden camera, and thinking, It's so crazy it just might be true.

It was true.

"Deputy Superintendent Brandsma authorized video monitoring from the hallway looking at the door to Kay Powers' classroom to determine if students were frequenting her classroom late at night or on weekends in violation of school policies and the district directives to Kay Powers," the report said.

Powers and her students were banned from using district equipment to publish an alternative newspaper. Powers' firing followed the district's discovery that a student had used a classroom computer to copy files from an e-mail account to his personal laptop for use in an alternative student newspaper.

It was unclear whether Brandsma would be disciplined; he could not be reached for comment on Friday.

The hidden camera was supposed to be in the hallway outside of the classroom, but the company hired to install it placed it on the ceiling inside Powers' room, according to the report. The camera was directed at the classroom door, the report said.

A video showing individuals from the waist up coming and going from the classroom was delivered to Brandsma. But now the video's "current whereabouts are unknown," the report said.

Patterson also concluded that there is "no evidence that any audio recordings were made."

Whitehead said she never saw the video recording and it played no role in her decision to fire Powers.

"My determination to terminate the employment was not retaliation. It was not an attempt to interfere with her free speech rights, and it was not based on any information seen or heard from any form of video or audio surveillance," she said.

Union leaders said they are glad the district now admits the camera was used.

"It does prove what we have been saying all along, that the district ... had practiced surveillance," said Kim Mead, president of the Everett Education Association. "I just find it so disappointing that they believe it is OK to treat employees in this manner."

So disappointing? How about "outrageous," "stupid," or "so tragic it's positively Shakespearean?"

watch those eyebrows

Not your own. Your students'. They might harbor surreptitious gang signs.

Some students at Centennial High School have shaved vertical lines into their eyebrows in a trend recently made popular by hip-hop star Soulja Boy. School officials say the mark looks like a gang symbol.

Centennial administrators are telling students with the lines that they can't return to school until they shave their eyebrows off. Assistant Principal Mark Porterfield said the students are not suspended, but they are not allowed in school until they cooperate.

Four students have been sent home. One returned with a bandage covering the shaved brow.

Life must be pretty good at Centennial High, if they have time to enforce perhaps the pettiest rule in the history of secondary education. (Given that history, no easy feat.)

Sadly, if my administration asked me to monitor my students eyebrow grooming, I'd have to meekly go along with it. RIF lists suck.

The Salary Gap

Here’s a spin-off from the post I did yesterday looking at teacher and administrator salary averages over the last 35 years here in Washington State.

We’ve heard a lot in the past few years about how CEO salaries are outpacing those of the workers by an ungodly percentage; this article gives a good overview. I was curious to see if that applied on our level, too.

Here are the average salaries for central office administrators, principals, and teachers from 1973-1974 and the current school year:

	1973-1974	2007-2008
Central Office	$19,540	$101,475
Principals	$17,368	$92,103
Teachers	$11,295	$49,903

This table shows the teacher salary as a percentage of the central office and principal salaries for the two years above (teacher salary/other salary):

	Central Office	Principals
73-74	57.8%	65.03%
07-08	49.18%	54.18%

So what does it mean?

In 1973, the average teacher made about 58% of the salary of the average superintendent. This year, the average teacher makes less than half of the average supe.

In 1973 the average teacher made 65% of the average principal. Now it’s 54%.

You could argue, then, that teacher salaries have not kept pace with administrative salaries. You could argue further that, given how the state funds administration, that this means that local money is being poured into administrator salaries at an increasingly aggressive pace.

The argument that I’d get from WASA and AWSP is that we need to attract quality people to the principalship and beyond by offering a quality salary. I won’t disagree with the point, but if you’re an administrator it’s also not a very good argument to make because it’s so damnably easy to turn on its head: don’t we also need to attract good people into the classroom by offering them a competitive salary as well?

I don’t know if these numbers matter, or if I’m reading them correctly. I think there’s something there, but I’m not sure what.

Any thoughts?