Dr. Janine Walker-Caffrey
By Joseph L. Kuchie —
PERTH AMBOY — The Superintendent’s plan to send administrators to Puerto Rico for teaching talent was criticized by numerous residents during last week’s Perth Amboy Board of Education Meeting,
The trip will cost the district $6,000 and is an attempt to recruit bilingual teachers from Puerto Rico to Perth Amboy. Four administrators were named as those potentially attending the trip.
The plan was created after months of failed searches for dual-certified bilingual teachers in the area. A total of 29 postings have been made to the Star-Ledger as well as 13 different job websites since last year, but none have had success.
Suzanne Carey, a teacher at Perth Amboy High School, did not support the trip, “I believe there are competent teachers and bilingual teachers that can be found in the surrounding areas, even in the states where the language is prominent,” Carey said. “I just think there’s things that $6,000 could be better spent upon for our kids right now then going somewhere for talent that we can find locally.”
Former Board President Samuel Lebrault also spoke on the trip and questioned the future of the bilingual program.
“If you go to Puerto Rico you’re going to get many teachers, not just one or two,” Lebrault said. “If you are re-staffing with these young people, which is what it looks like, what is the future of this program that has been suffering the past couple years?”
The administrators chosen to go on the trip made a presentation to the board and audience explaining all the details.
Bernice Marshall, Manager of Human Resources, explained that all four administrators would gladly pay their own way to save the district money and McGinnis School Principal Myrna Garcia emphasized the need to find talent elsewhere.
“It’s not sufficient to find a teacher that is only Spanish speaking. We are looking for teachers that have the academic vocabulary that is needed to teach physics, math, language arts,” Garcia said. “I am fluent in Spanish but I can’t go and teach a business class because I don’t have that vocabulary. We are doing our children a disservice.”
Although the vote was passed, many board members had an issue with how the trip was presented. Milady Tejeda expressed disappointment over finding out about the trip after getting the agenda and Obdulia Gonzalez believed there should have been more information before a vote was made.
“I understand the dilemma we have here. We don’t have the bilingual teachers because the students are going into other professions,” Gonzalez said. “However, I think this should have come as a full proposal instead of just being in the agenda. I need to work harder at the table and I think we could have done more homework.”
Superintendent Caffrey stood by her decision for the trip, stating that now was the time to start hiring and the district had the money to spend. Earlier in the meeting, Board Secretary Derek Jess made a presentation about the proposed school budget for 2013-2014 and pointed out a $60 million surplus.
We had 98 openings at the start of the school year, we can’t have that again,” Caffrey said. “Now is the time to start bringing people in. It’s only $6,000 out of a $60 million surplus. I don’t want to repeat what happened this year.”
The proposal passed four votes to three. Vice President Ken Puccio saw the trip as something that was necessary, but explained that the board should take something from the discussion they had.
“These administrators have exhausted it, we can see it by this data they presented. We have a building principal willing to pay his own way,” Puccio said. “We all want to do what’s right. I think we learned something from this tonight.”
All board members were in attendance for the meeting.
