Last week on Wicked Local, School Committee Chairman Matt Hills suggested that the School Committee was ready to move on from the David Fleishman plagiarism incident and return its focus to other issues facing our schools.
This is “a very serious issue,” Hills said. “But we’ve acted appropriately. The decision is done. It’s behind us now, and everyone – including the superintendent – is moving forward.
Hills clarified his comment to me in an email this weekend, saying he meant the committee is moving on but that it was up to the community to determine how, when or if it wants to move on.
I think that’s a reasonable position, although I know some will disagree.
(However, I do think there’s some issues related to how the SC deliberated this; why Fleishman’s remarks weren’t made public sooner; and whether the SC followed proper procedures that I hope the TAB, The Globe and perhaps the Secretary of State, will thoroughly investigate. But that’s a topic for a different thread.)
But the topic I’d like to discuss here is: Where do we as a community go from here? While some may clamor for Fleishman to be fired, it’s unlikely that this School Committee is going to do that.
Meanwhile, we’re about six weeks away from the start of a new school year. And as many have discussed here, and as a story in the Globe today pondered, there really should be a plan for how our schools address this incident and teach the value of attribution.
The rash of adults getting caught is all the more embarrassing since schools preach the importance of giving proper academic credit, and spell out the consequences in student handbooks.
Newton South High School says that cheating and plagiarism are “serious violations of the personal and academic standards of the school and are destructive to the learning process,” and warns that plagiarized assignments will receive a zero.
Here’s Terry Malloy’s suggestion:
Rather than a monetary punishment, how about a personal letter of apology to the graduates that were addressed and, when school is in session this fall, a discussion at each High School(and Middle Schools?), led by the Superintendent, of all the issues involved.
It could be an interesting learning opportunity for all.
What’s your suggestion?
What to do: The SC needs to meet again soon. They need to approve the Minutes for the last few meetings such that they can be published.
What not to do: The SC should not have discussions (electronically or face-to-face) about “What to Do”. No, don’t do that — these Open Meeting issues can compound themselves.
FYI — in the last two years, the SC each year come to us in June to disclose the final accounting for the year. Each year they closed with between $1.7 and $2 million in surplus (last year was three months after asking voters for more funds). Where’s the FY14 numbers??
The mayor, the SC chair, the SC, and the superintendent all have decided this was a minor issue, and they think the right thing is to move on and forget it happened. And so that is most likely what will happen here in Newton; no big change from the norm.
It was written in one of these thread that the Newton teachers really like DF; the example given was that he thinks they really can spell “collaboration”. In today’s Boston Globe article: “Jane Franz, a teacher at Newton North High School, said she did not believe the superintendent’s actions would erode efforts to prevent plagiarism among students.” I also believe the efforts to prevent plagiarism will not erode because it will be the teachers, who will make the effort, not the SC and the superintendent. The teachers, as a whole, are a professional group that truly wants to improve the knowledge and ethics of our students. DF has just made their jobs harder come September. The students’ actions will affect how much harder the teachers’ jobs will be. DF has removed himself from the situation.
The only action with significance that I can see people doing is with their votes. I for one have a better understanding of the qualifications of our current mayor and SC chair. I will be looking for candidates that have a code of ethics and a sense of taking accountability for one’s actions that are closer to mine. DF is safe in his position; the general population can not vote for him.
Move along folks. Nothing to see here. Just your elected officials trying to pull the wool over your eyes.
How dare Hills say… “It’s behind us now, and everyone–including the Superintendent–is moving forward.”
That’s some kinda brazen arrogance from a guy who got caught in a political coverup. The new poster child for all that is wrong with newton politics. Ugh!
@Matt Hills– Do the right thing. Resign your leadership position.
I’m a longtime supporter of the general direction in which our School Committee has taken the school system over the past 15 years or so, but I am so deeply troubled by what the school superintendent did, and how the current School Committee responded, that I feel compelled to comment.
I see two ways in which Newton should respond if we are truly to move forward and put this incident behind us.
First, I endorse Terry Malloy’s suggestion, but I submit that it doesn’t go far enough. The school superintendent must APOLOGIZE for what he’s done. So far he has released an arrogant, namby-pamby statement in which he barely acknowledges that he did something wrong. If the priority of our school system is preparing our students for life in the real world, they must understand that plagiarism is wrong, pure and simple. That message has not gotten through so far — au contraire! Whether it’s in a letter to students and parents, who are obviously most affected, or a statement to all Newton residents, because we all suffer from the stain to the reputation of our schools and our city brought on by the superintendent’s plagiarism, the superintendent must apologize!
Second, the mayor and School Committee must come clean, because it is quite clear that they covered up what happened here in the hopes that it would go away without ever seeing the light of day. How many “executive sessions” were really held? Who was included (it’s been said that there was consultation with a professional public relations/crisis management expert — is that true? Was there payment involved? From what source?). All notes/documentation, etc. from those meetings should be made public. Otherwise how can we trust current school committee leadership going forward, not to mention the mayor’s leadership — and did the mayor really exert any leadership at all as this played out?
Only once the superintendent has truly apologized and the elected officials responsible for levying a fine that basically equates plagiarizing with a pro athlete missing curfew lay bare the process they used to reach and justify that solution can Newton truly move forward, with or without current leadership in place.
I hate to disappoint those who are eagerly awaiting minutes from the Executive Session, but I don’t think they’re going to tell us anything. If they publish the minutes, why would it be a closed session? I suspect it will say something to the effect of, “A personnel issue was discussed.”
I’m sure someone (Alderman Hess-Mahan?) will correct me if I’m wrong.
Gail — From p. 13 of the link: “Public bodies are required to create and maintain accurate minutes of all meetings, including executive sessions. The minutes, which must be created and approved in a timely manner, must state the date, time and place of the meeting, a list of the
members present or absent, and the decisions made and actions taken including a
record of all votes.”
http://www.mass.gov/ago/docs/government/oml/oml-guide.pdf
For one, I’d be interested if they let the two student reps step in exec. session. Probably not,but if there was ever a private matter that they could contribute, this is it.
I think –and hope — you are mistaken Gail. The minutes should at minimum include any motions and votes.
But we won’t see anything about the discussion leading up to those motions and votes. I guess we’ll find out if it was a unanimous decision though.
Our school system and city leaders are generally quick to organize community meetings in times of crisis. Think of the events after revelations about school personal involved with trafficking pornography, student suicides, Newtown, etc. I’m not suggesting that this is of the same magnitude. But the model for organizing and announcing a gathering bring experts, elected leaders and citizens together to talk about this is probably still worth following.
Gail — I know what you’re saying but the SC did at least two private meetings where the public had no basis to know what was going on, and no basis to object to their privacy. I’m just asking that they follow procedure (the Law) from this point forward. What other private sessions took place over time where the public didn’t get word?
Greg, I hope that I am misunderstanding what Matt Hills told you in his email. It’s dismaying to hear that the leader of the School Committee representatives might actually be saying that the School Committee considers this “done …behind us now” and that the School Committee is moving forward regardless of “how, when, or if” the community it represents is ready to move forward.
“representative?” “I do not think it means what you think it means.”
I don’t think that the community can “move forward” from this without the active engagement of the School Committee and the Superintendent.
Note: The next School Committee meeting (that I am aware of) will be Wednesday, August 13 at 2PM, in Room 210 of the Education Center.
@Bruce: I don’t want to pretend to speak for Matt Hills and I encourage him to clarify for himself here.
However, I interpreted it to mean that the committee had already decided on the reprimand (i.e. the one week pay penalty) and to keep David Fleishman on as superintendent and that they would not be reconsidering those two specific decisions.
I agree with Terry and also with this column in the Globe:
http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/07/28/plagiarism-just-banality-that-contagious/vIZLf1HM27OOn0P64yYaEM/story.html
Does anyone know how much Hills’ salary is as Chairman of the School Committee?
Has anyone looked into the veracity of the resumes that these people presented for their jobs given that some are prone to a little writer’s embellishment it appears? I saw on Indeed.com that the city is hiring a new HR person to find talent for the city. Does that mean that there is no one currently fact checking the resumes of potential new hires? I hope that the city is thoroughly screening its candidates given this current scandal.
Patrick – As a point of clarification, in a previous post I related an incident that occurred at an administrative meeting during which principals ridiculed elementary teachers using the spelling of the word “collaboration” as a source of a so-called joke. It was meant to illustrate that under previous administrations, Newton teachers at the elementary level were often treated treated in a disrespectful manner and that it’s improved significantly with this administration. This is really off-point here, but it’s always best for a blogger to clarify his/her thinking when there’s a miscommunication.
I’ll have to read the Globe today, but I do agree with “that” teacher that we’ll be able to handle this one quite easily. A few kids will try to get aways with things, as teenagers tend to do, but I’ve found that as close to 100% of the parents as one could possibly hope for are supportive of our efforts in this regard to this issue.
I’m familiar with the teacher quoted in the Globe article as well and know that she’s really a terrific asset to our community.
@Newton Gal: There you go again with another blanket statement disparaging the men and women who work for our city. I’ve actually found the caliber of people who work here to be quite high.
@mgwa – Jennifer Graham writes in that op-ed “The real offense here — as in the case of Newton superintendent David Fleishman, who lost a week’s pay for his unattributed quotation of Deval Patrick — is the oratorical pablum that our graduates are commonly served.”
You agree that boring speeches are worse than plagiarized ones?
I thought the attitude in that piece was exactly what we don’t need to hear. Plagiarism is a serious offense from an educational leader.
We pride ourselves on having great schools in Newton. How would Belmont Hill, Roxbury Latin or BB&N respond if a principal were caught plagiarizing a speech in front of all the students and their parents on graduation day?
@Steven – I read that sentence as hyperbole, and as the least important part of what the author was saying. More to the point:
The pack mule that is our subconscious staggers under the weight of quickly scanned memes and forwarded e-mails that assault us each day. Fleishman said, and I believe him, that he didn’t intentionally echo Patrick’s rhetorical question: Can social media bring peace? Phrases are sticky. When a seemingly original thought emerges, it’s difficult to determine if it’s our own genius, or a memory of someone else’s, dislodged by a recent Red Bull. If the latter, we’re still copycats, but without teeth or claws.
I agree with Terry Malloy that letters should be sent to the graduates acknowledging the efforts of their school journalists and most importantly, addressing the plagiarizism with a true apology and acceptance of responsibility from the superintendent. It should be carefully written and contain no excuses, no “I’m sorry, but …,” no “I’m sorry if I caused …”, or any other type of political or celebrity “apology.” The graduates and students know what is being discussed and need to know that when those in authority are wrong, they admit it, take responsibility for it and do what is necessary to resolve it. A fine means nothing to them – it doesn’t mean much to most people; if it’s the answer to “what’s the worst that can happen,” it is just leveraged in to the cost of doing business. That’s what they see happening all the time now. At the beginning of the school year, high school students need to be treated with the respect due those who work hard and follow the rules. Their principals and teachers need handle this incident as they do any school wide problem and I have great confidence that they will. It’s one more thing they will add to their crazy, busy schedules because they care about their students.
Using this blog to air new found venom toward elected representatives you’ve clearly expressed your opinion of before is annoying, but evidently unavoidable. It seems to be in every thread. If you could just accept that these people are what you are stuck with until you can theoretically vote them out, it would certainly be less stressful.
Greg, I accept and welcome your interpretation that Matt was referring to those two specific decisions being behind us. I also welcome the engagement of the School Committee and Superintendent in bringing our community to a place from which we can all move forward. Several people on this thread have contributed helpful suggestions for that.
Jane, I apologize for misrepresenting your prior comment. I was working from memory since I could not find the the thread in which it was placed. Your general message was that teachers appear to prefer the current administration, which is headed up by DF. My comment was intended to point out that DF’s behavior has let the teachers down, and he has not offered an apology to them regarding this issue of apparent plagiarism and a questionable cover up.
I will wait to see how the students react. One (or more) on V14 can call me paranoid or old for remembering the spring of 1970 when the students en masse from both high school, and some of the junior high students, walked out of their classrooms on strike because of the Kent State scenario, a national event. This current issue has no where near the national aspect to stir the emotions of teenagers. Yet the proximity of this misdeed and that it was transgressed by the top person of their educational system, which has strong punishment for plagiarism in its code of conduct, could motivate the current students to take some collective action. DF will expect the teachers to be the front line in dealing with any disciplinary actions to be taken. That sounds to me like extra work necessitated by DF’s actions. I wish you good luck.
@Patrick: I wonder how many of these kids are familiar with Kent State.
Kent State? This subject matter is off the wall disgusting.
Gail, I win my bet that you would offer a snide remark. Thank you for staying predictable.
Maybe the students who study American History, if it is still a state requirement to pass for graduation, had to write a paper addressing the Vietnam era. They would know about Kent State unless they just scooped a paper off the internet and plagiarized it (heavens forbid someone from Newton would plagiarize something).
I used the Kent State example because it did show that there is an example of Newton students reacting en masse to a situation that they found intolerable and unfair. Many cities and towns had similar high school student strikes. As I recall, Newton was the only city/town reported to have junior high students join the strike. That shows that civil disobedience has a history of running long and deep within our student population. The students do not need to know about Kent State; it is in their DNA to have the courage to stand up against unacceptable behavior by our public leaders. They have two of their peers as current examples.
Gail, there are several issues here.
First, before the issue finally became public, the School Committee clearly failed to comply with the notice requirements of the Open Meeting Law. The clerk provided me with copies of all notices that were posted and only one, dated July 9 for a meeting on July 11, indicated a “personnel matter” would be discussed. That means the meeting Matt Hills referred to in June, on the Monday after June 27 when he was first informed of the issue, and possibly other nonpublic meetings, including the “telephone” meeting, violated the Open Meeting Law. The public deserves a better explanation as to how that happened and why he claimed to have complied with the Open Meeting Law when asked by the media.
Second, the exception that was invoked relates to discussions concerning “the reputation, character, physical condition or mental health, rather than professional competence, of an individual, or to discuss the discipline or dismissal of, or complaints or charges brought against, a public officer, employee, staff member or individual.” Arguably, this involved a complaint against an employee concerning reputation and character, although it could also just as easily be argued that it involved “professional competence” in which case the meeting should have been held in public. Regardless, according to the Attorney General’s OML guide, the purpose of the exception is “to protect the rights and reputation of individuals.” The individual is entitled to notice but can waive his/her rights and have the meeting in public. Nevertheless, notice of the meeting, and an explanation that does not compromise those individual rights, is required prior to voting to go into executive session to provide the public with information about the purpose of the meeting.
Third, to the extent the Superintendent’s rights and reputation justified holding the meeting in private, the facts and decisions of the School Committee have now been made public, albeit without disclosing what else may have been discussed and whether other motions were made but not approved. Absent some exception, the public is entitled to know how its representatives make their decisions. The records of the meeting should at least be as complete as the minutes that are available on the School Committee website. They could provide valuable insight into the reasons for the punishment and the delay in public disclosure. Or they may just indicate the when, where and who along with the motions and votes. Even that could shed some light on how the School Committee arrived at its decision. For instance, did the Superintendent participate in the discussions about the appropriate censure or was he asked to leave the room so the members could speak freely? But, in any event, given that the School Committee failed to even provide notice of most of the meetings held in executive session, a better explanation is required than has been provided thus far.
Finally, whether the School Committee must provide full disclosure is a different question from whether it should. I think it should. As I noted above, I also think the public deserves better answers as to why the SC failed to comply with the notice requirements of the OML. The leadership of the SC are veteran members who should have known better. It naturally raises questions as to whether other meetings have been held in private without proper notice to the public. But to continue to maintain secrecy based on the Open Meeting Law after having violated the very same law gives the appearance there is something to hide, even if there is not. So, the sooner the SC comes clean and gives a full account, the sooner the community can “move forward” too.
Ted – are decisions that are made in Executive sessions that are not held in accordance with OML Valid?
Joanne, the Attorney General could invalidate a vote at a meeting which was held in violation of the Open Meeting Law. The law states in relevant part that:
A written complaint must be filed with the public body 30 days before being filed with the Attorney General, in order to allow the public body to remedy the violation. The public body has 14 days to file a copy of the complaint with and notify the Attorney General of any remedial action taken.
THM – Thanks for the explanation .