A public school in Far Rockaway Queens, N.Y., has been accused of operating under unacceptable conditions (image source Google Maps)
Posted on 01/15/2014 8:28:22 AM PST by Lucky9teen
A recent report on a school in Queens, N.Y., is so unbelievable, so terribly sad, that it has left many readers practically speechless.
A public school in Far Rockaway Queens, N.Y., has been accused of operating under unacceptable conditions (image source Google Maps)
From students reportedly being forced to attend class in vermin-infested “temporary classrooms” that “smell like urine” to Principal Marcella Sills, 48, apparently being a frequent no-show, public school (PS) 106 in Far Rockaway, N.Y., is a “school of no,” according to the New York Post.
The students don’t get gym or art classes, one source said. Instead, many are put in front of a television and watch movies all day.
“The kids have seen more movies than Siskel and Ebert,” a source said.
The school nurse’s office is woefully underequipped (no cot and no sink) and the library is a total wreck.
“Nothing’s in order,” said a source. “It’s a junk room.”
The school doesn’t bother with substitute teachers, temporary classrooms are reportedly infested with vermin and “smell of urine,” students with learning disabilities don’t have their required special-education co-teacher and, again, the principal, who joined about nine years ago, is a frequent no-show.
“Sills did not come to school last Monday. On Tuesday, she showed up at 3:30 p.m. On Wednesday, The Post found her at home in Westbury, LI, all day before emerging at 2:50 p.m. — school dismissal time. Wearing a fur coat, she took her BMW for a spin,” the report reads. “She showed up at school Thursday, but not Friday.”
Sources said that on the rare occasion Sillis shows up for work, it’s usually after 11:00 a.m.
Keep in mind Sills earns roughly $128,207 per year.
“She strolls in whenever she wants,” a source said.
“A Department of Education spokesman said Sills was required to report her absences and tardiness to District 27 Superintendent Michelle Lloyd-Bey but would not say whether Sills did so last week,” the Post report adds.
Amazingly enough, Sill’s pocketed nearly $2,900 for 83 hours of overtime pay in 2011.
“This school is a complete s- -thole, but nobody in a position of power comes to investigate. No one cares,” a community member said.
Hurricane Sandy in 2012 badly damaged part of the school building, forcing the school’s administrators to move two kindergarten classes into “temporary classroom units” in the yard.
A school spokesman denied reports that the “temporary classroom units” are infested with vermin.
Many students are forced to share classrooms, some are squeezed into storage rooms and the pre-K students are placed in the school’s auditorium.
The parts of the building that were damaged in the hurricane still haven’t been repaired.
Students in several grades told the Post that they spent most of last week watching “Fat Albert,” “Alvin and the Chipmunks” and “Monsters, Inc.”
But they say they didn’t enjoy it.
“I like gym. I like to draw,” one student said, adding that her classmates are similarly restless. “They’re always making noise, and there’s nothing entertaining going on. No art, no gym, no music class.”
Further, despite the fact that they’re five months into the school year, teachers still haven’t received the most recent books or teacher’s guides.
“They have no reading program, no math program,” one source said.
Sills reportedly blames outside forces for failing to send the relevant material.
Teachers cope by finding the material online and printing out lessons on paper they purchased themselves.
The Post report adds that the school staff is afraid to speak up for fear of retaliation from Sills or the school union.
PS 106 (image source: Google maps)
And here’s another important note from the report: “PS 106 is allocated $2.9 million to serve a low-income population with 98 percent of its students eligible for free lunches. As a Title 1 school, it gets extra federal funds, but community members say they’ve never seen a budget tracking the income and spending.”
Luckily, after reading the report on Sunday, Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina assigned a deputy to check out the school on Monday.
“What was reported … is unacceptable, and if true will be immediately addressed,” Farina said in prepared statement.
Farina then dispatched Deputy Chancellor Dorita Gibson to look investigate the school’s conditions.
Sills managed Monday to show up at around 7:30 a.m., something a source said she hadn’t done in nearly seven years.
“We are very concerned about what is going on in this school. Our children deserve to have quality education. Today we are here to make sure that our children are not being cheated from learning. We want to make sure that they can succeed,” Queens City Councilman Donovan Richards said Monday.
Richards was scheduled to meet with Gibson after her investigation to discuss her findings.
“We will see what the new administration that has come in is going to do with this,” said Richards, who met with angry parents at the school before classes Monday morning.
“I think that based on what I’ve heard today there’s a lot of work to be done,” he said.
A PS 106 spokesperson did not immediately respond to TheBlaze’s request for comment.
Click here to read more on the situation at PS 106.
Followed up with this: Glenn Beck Outlines How America Can Start Fixing Its Failing Education System
In Alabama, Mississippi or Tennessee....it would be shut-down in seven days. The fact that the locals accept it...says a lot about themselves, and their view of life around them.
Pretty sad deal. If I were a kid there? I’d hope a train and put as much distance between me, the parents, and the neighborhood as possible. There’s nothing there to stay for. Just misery.
This is what happens when you eliminate performance monitoring. Without some discipline and work standards, however monitored, an organization degenerates. It doesn’t matter whether people are motivated by pride of performance, money, or fear of firing, the workers and managers have to give a crap about what they are doing.
I’ll bet the adminisration and teachers are all doing well though with fat, chubby salaries. Throw in some Common Core for laughs, and then who knows what will happen?
If this were a day-care center for children, it would be shut down in a New York minute (for those in Rio Linda, that means “really, really fast”).
But, tenured members of the NY teachers’ union have a degree of immunity not even accorded to foreign dignitaries.
Some 95% of the personal woe that people have to endure is self-induced. In this instance, the personal woe goes back to the failure to inculcate a sense of responsibility for the situation starting in the homes of the children, and passing up through the entire community to the office of the Mayor, where under the present regime now in charge, it shall surely die, as this is not their abiding concern.
Bringing up the next generation unfit to do anything but cash their welfare checks and providing cushy jobs for NEA Black administrators. If NY taxpayers are this stupid, they deserve the results of another wasted generation.
And yet Comrade DeBlasio is bound and determined to kill-off charter schools.
How PC! In the picture just above the ‘8’ is a face. Fur coat - check, fur hat - check. Hmmm. what’s different? What don’t they want to show? Any guesses?
The NYT was too busy with their ridiculous account of Benghazi, a vain effort to whitewash Hillary’s shameful lying, to cover this outrageous misappropriation of tax dollars at this school. The editors of this Leftist rag are no better at dong their job than this school administration is at doing theirs.
I’ll bet something like 95% of the parents, faculty and administration all have one thing in common: They voted for Obama in 2012. Well, maybe only 90%.
Neighborhood where Richard Feymann grew up.
60 years ago the students of PS 106 were apparently mostly Jewish and went on to become physicists and neurosurgeons.
Now not so much.
that’s raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaacisssssssssssssssssssssssssss
For the life of me I cannot understand how parents would stand for this. Do they just not care abotu their children>
Depends on the precinct. They might have voted 120% for Obama.
Don’t overlook their fat pensions that go on for decades.
Kids in third world countries don’t have it this bad.
Think of all the wasted lives. Most of these kids will be on the government dole for the rest of their natural lives, if they're lucky enough not to be gunned down long before they reach this age.
This is what New Yorkers want. It is what they vote for over and over again. Nobody investigates because, really, nobody much cares. Leftist keep telling the low-information voter that Republicans are evil and that their idea for Charter Schools is baaaad.
And this school is a classic example of what the Marxists give to their people. Make no mistake, while this school may be somewhat worse, yet most every major city in the USA has many schools and districts just like the School of No.
And yet, this is what the people want. This is what people demand! If they didn't really want this they could change how they vote, plain and simple. But they refuse to vote for the other guys because their racists, haters, want to kill grandma and dirty the water and air.
But these people CHOOSE to listen to these lies and as long as they keep voting for the Marxists who profess love for them this is the type of love they'll get.
I have absolutely no sympathy or outrage. And I don't fault Principle Sills either. She's only doing what she was hired to do. The district certainly knew all about this yet does nothing. The vast expanse of the NYTimes knew about this, yet said nothing. Bloomberg knew about this, but did nothing. These people are deBlasio voters so I guarantee when any media focus dies down history will show that only window dressing changes were made and nothing will really change.
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