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Okay, my gf is a teacher in Palmdale, CA. She's got a general ed credential and was trained as a general ed teacher in WA state for K-12 teaching. Since last September, she's been teaching sixth grade special ed. She's got kids that flip out and tear stuff up, kids that tell her they hate themselves, one down's kid, and several that seem regular enough but are behind.

She's had an EXTREMELY rough week/month/year and this will be her first real break after learning that her principal doesn't want her at the school next year. Only she (principal) didn't say ANYTHING about any problems prior to thursday. And she won't tell my gf why she doesn't want her around. It's stupid.

I'll tell you what, DO NOT EVER let any of your teacher friends think about going to a teaching job in Palmdale, CA. They do things like take a first year teacher, who has a general ed credential, and put them in their first classroom as a special ed teacher, yet they don't give you any ideas on what to teach, who to talk to, what to do, and if you have a problem kid, it's special ed. Deal with it. If I were in my girlfriend's shoes, I would have told my principal to @#%$ off since she's not giving a reason why she's terminating the contract at the end of the year. And I would have definitely given her a piece of my mind. CA state law says she doesn't have to, but the woman doesn't even give the courtesy to state what Katie is doing wrong.

The problem is that if Katie's principal is saying that she doesn't want her at the school next year, and the termination goes on Katie's record, then she'll have to explain that to future employers. AND I don't see how Katie will get a letter of recommendation from her current principal if she doesn't want her to teach there next year (and by the sound of it, if she had her way, Katie would never teach in Palmdale again). Talk about #$##ing BULL$#!T!

I know for a fact that Katie is not a bad teacher. She's a first year teacher, so she'll have some jitters. She's got zero experience teaching special ed students, but she's got them almost to the level of a general ed class (these are retarded kids, down's kids, kids that have severe emotional problems, and kids that just don't care). Katie puts her entire heart into her class (I know... I often don't get to spend too much time with her even though I live with her!) It's taking a lot of my patience to stop myself from writing a letter to Katie's principal and telling her she's full of @#%$. Especially since I know that the woman has NEVER once offered any support... Katie has been assigned a class, told to teach, and then that's the last thing you hear from any sort of management or supervisor. And they expect her to know everything? And when Katie asks, they're too busy to answer; or too much like a teenager sighing after they're told to clean their room!



So most of my time has been spent supporting my gf (pretty much every day). I don't mind, but for her principal to basically say that Katie sucks as a teacher, when it's quite the opposite, really, I mean REALLY pisses me off.

Send a polite letter to the district super from Katie's P.O.V.?

I don't know.

Ya know, if the parents of those special ed kids like Katie as a teacher, and feel she has done a good job teaching, a polite letter from Katie to the parents may not be a bad idea. It's a tricky thing to do, but even if she mentions it to her kids, they almost always tell their parents about it, and parents can be a huge force for good if they like you. It happened to a teacher I had in HS, and the parents and Students got his job back, but then he didn't take it on the principle of the whole thing, even though he would have been tenured then. There's more to the story, but that's the gist.

I'm sure she'll get a job somewhere else if this thing doesn't go her way. Good teachers are hard to come by.

Asha, after reading your post, I called up my mom and asked about this. She was a Lit. teacher for 34 years in Illinois. I've also got an aunt that started out teaching in Palmdale, CA, and I'll see if I can query her about this as well.

From our conversation, some advice came up.

1.) In IL, it is required that a teacher actually have Special Ed certifications from her college before she can teach SE classes. This may not be the case in California, but it's something worth looking into. The general trend in CA, as I've been told, is that they are massively short on teachers and will put first-years anywhere.

2.) Katie needs to talk to her Teachers' Union rep ASAP. If she has joined the local union, they will be her best bet for help. If she hasn't, they should at least be able to advise her on the situation.

3.) As for the grievance the principal has with her.... well, again it may be different in IL, but there, if there is a grievance against a teacher, it cannot go into her file until she has seen it in writing and signed off on it. Rules may be different in CA, but also something worth checking into.

General theme here is that first-years don't have a lot of pulling power at all. Tenure makes these kinds of situations easier to deal with.

Keep us updated, eh?