Apr 2, 2009 10:46 PM
A coalition of enraged but self-controlled parents, staff, major community organizations and elected officials, estimated by police at “easily 200” in number, filled the street from block to block in front of JHS 8 in Jamaica, Queens, demanding the ouster of its principal, John Murphy.
They hoisted many posters carrying a single essential message. One of them read “Teacher and Respect: two 7-letter words that go together.”
The demonstrators were motivated by what they perceived as Murphy’s long and systematic abuse of power. Among the fliers they distributed were old news articles about his failed leadership at several other districts across two states.
“Principals need to understand their role is that of a leader, not a bully or tyrant,” UFT President Randi Weingarten said to the demonstrators. “Murphy’s history of persecuting, rather than collaborating, is intolerable. He has driven out 15 teachers just in the last year. These were teachers who were instrumental in improving the school’s grade from a D to a B over that period of time.”
Rona Freiser, the UFT Queens borough representative, emphasized that “we are all role models for our students and to permit them to be exposed to this principal’s erratic behavior goes against everything we believe in.”
Murphy has held at least five other positions since 1996. According to the Danbury News-Times of March 2, 2004, he quit his six-month stint as principal of Connecticut’s Danbury HS in 2004 following a protest letter signed by more than 150 staffers.
At JHS 8, a school aide recently was taken to the hospital after a verbal outburst from Murphy.
A teacher who had sent him an e-mail saying she was applying for a medical sabbatical discovered that he forwarded her e-mail to the entire staff.
Several teachers complain that he intimidated them into inflating students’ grades to boost the school’s ratings, as reported in the March 27 New York Daily News.
Other staff members cite a litany of other indignities. Tabio DaCruz, the school’s chapter leader, has documented the allegations.
“We will not allow any DOE personnel to degrade our integrity or our union,” he said.
The Jamaica chapter of the NAACP is launching an investigation, and a number of other highly regarded community and church organizations expressed exasperation with Murphy. City Councilman Leroy Comrie said, “I’m at the point where I’m fed up with the principal.”
In the presence of children, Murphy (who refers to himself as the “superintendent,” although he is not one) reportedly shouted to a teacher to “bring your personal belongings and come with me!”
He publicly told another: “You are the weak link. The sooner you are out of here the better!”
Another was told to “carry around your resignation letter wherever you go so that you will always remember how disposable you are!”
In front of an audience he called another “dead wood who should retire.”
He has gone beyond the scope of his authority by threatening teachers’ pensions, it is claimed. A teacher states that the morning after she left school midday upon being notified that her mother had just had a heart attack, Murphy placed a letter in her mailbox calling her absence into question.
Another claim along similar lines says that after getting punched in the face by a student, a teacher who was recovering at home the following day got a call from the principal demanding to know why she wasn’t at work. Although the student had allegedly threatened to kill the teacher, he was invited to return to school the next day.
“Nothing can be done unless you press charges, but if you press charges you will no longer be working here,” the principal allegedly warned the teacher.
Murphy is allegedly in the habit of intruding into the personal lives of teachers. He is said to have checked on a teacher’s absence by phoning her residence and then asking the teacher’s mother whether the teacher was married.
Many other grave charges have been leveled against Murphy. They include gross racial and ethnic bias, manipulation of the school’s Quality Review and labeling special needs kids “paranoid schizophrenics.”
Many in the UFT chapter vowed not to let up until the principal is removed, for which Weingarten and other union officials promised their support.