September 2012
When students, as they sometimes do,
decide they don’t like a school policy and make a show of defiance — showing up
in the T-shirt they were told to leave at home, or with the pink punk haircut
that violates the dress code — my general reaction is that they should quit
making a spectacle of themselves and do what they’re told. There are rules in
society; if you object there are established procedures for communicating and
dealing with that fact. It’s hogwash to argue, as is too often done, that any
hindrance on an individual’s ability to do whatever they please is somehow a
violation of fundamental rights.
Mr. Dorval’s view on the policy was
correct: it’s ridiculous to teach students that they can fail to do the work and
still get the reward. But respect works both ways: you want it from the
students, you have to give it to the principal.
Before the courier came to his
suburban Edmonton home this week with a letter explaining that his boss wants
him fired, high school teacher Lynden Dorval thought his principal had bowed to
the media firestorm.
Three months ago, Mr. Dorval went
public with his struggle against Ross Sheppard High School’s no-zero policy,
making him a lightning rod for a debate on how to teach a generation often
billed as having a sense of entitlement.
But on Tuesday, the letter from the
superintendent of Edmonton Public Schools informed him his principal, Ron
Bradley, requested his termination for “his obvious neglect of duty as a
professional teacher, his repeated insubordination and his continued refusal to
obey lawful orders.”
Mr. Dorval, 61, is scheduled to appear
before superintendent Edgar Schmidt to plead his case next month.
“I had convinced myself with all the
publicity that I wasn’t actually going to get fired,” he said. “From the very
beginning, I kept telling myself that this was going to be the outcome. But I
guess I convinced myself that something else might happen.”
The physics teacher, who colleagues
called Captain Zero, spent 18 months disobeying the school’s rule against doling
out zeros to students who didn’t complete assignments or tests, which school
management sees as a discipline issue, not an academic one.
Mr. Dorval was put on an indefinite
suspension after refusing to heed several warnings and reprimands from the
school principal — according to the principal’s recommendation, the teacher once
went as far as going into the school’s grades database and reentering zero marks
that had been changed by a department head.
News of Mr. Dorval’s suspension
prompted a public outcry.
“The students need to develop that
intrinsic motivation to do it on their own,” said Mr. Dorval, who has been
teaching for 35 years.
Mr. Bradley, who spearheaded the
school policy, was unavailable for comment Thursday. But according to letters
from the principal about Mr. Dorval’s case, the impetus of the program was to
avoid discouraging students and to “hold students accountable for completion of
work.”
The Edmonton Public Schools board
voted in June to review its policies on student assessment “to ensure clarity,
consistency and to ensure that students are held to high standards.” That
investigation is scheduled for this fall.
But ahead of that review, Mr. Dorval
is scheduled to appear Sept. 10 before the superintendent to address the
principal’s calls for his termination.
Edmonton school board spokeswoman
Cheryl Oxford couldn’t comment on the specifics of Mr. Dorval’s case due to
privacy issues. But Ms. Oxford said the dismissal is an employment issue —
unrelated to the board’s review of its grading policies.
In his letter to the superintendent,
the principal said Mr. Dorval was repeatedly absence in staff meetings — a claim
Mr. Dorval says is untrue.
The veteran teacher also sent a
staff-wide email condemning the no zero policy, Mr. Bradley said.
“I advised Mr. Dorval that I was not
disputing his professional right to express his opinion but … I found his tone
and method of communication insubordinate,” Mr. Bradley wrote.
Following the suspension, the
principal reported that Mr. Dorval entered the school without requesting
permission — part of the terms of his suspension — twice to return unmarked
quizzes and assignments, and once to voice concerns about his replacement
teacher, Mr. Bradley wrote.
In June, Mr. Dorval told the
National Post he chose to fight the policy, in part, because he was planning
to retire anyway. But he has decided to continue teaching, regardless of the
Sept. 10 decision — because when he was told to clear out his office, he was in
the midst of the best semester he’d had in a decade.
“It’s kind of ironic, I had thought
about retiring many times until last semester,” he said. “I’ve reconsidered my
retirement plan for at least a couple of years.”
National Post, Aug 30, 2012.
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