Cathedral High School has a top reputation as an all-girls high school of the Archdiocese of New York. However, this past week has been rough: Teachers from Cathedral, as well as from nine other Catholic high schools, had a sickout. Plus, a former teacher admitted to assaulting students.
The sickout occurred because non-clergy teachers have been in a contract dispute with the Archdiocese. The Lay Faculty Association's Anthony Cusimano told NY1 they wanted to negotiate but the Archdiocese "refuse[s] to bargain." The teachers want to raise top pay from $52,000 to $60,000, but the church says $58,000 is its final offer. But one student said, "The archdiocese has the money to give the teachers what they want."
Eight of the schools, including Cathedral High, had to close because of the lack of teachers, but in a golden moment of bureaucracy, the students at Cathedral High had to get permission to leave. From the NY Times, how dismissing students was unexpectedly difficult:
But, in order to leave the school, at 350 East 56th Street, in the Turtle Bay section of Manhattan, students needed a faxed permission form from their parents, and some families did not have a fax machine. “They were crying,” Stephanie said. By early afternoon, however, permission over the telephone was enough.
Well, let's hope the next time there's a sickout it's not so confusing as more sickouts are expected.
And yesterday, the Queens DA announced that Richard Ali, 28, a former biology teacher, biology club supervisor and soccer coach, admitted to assaulting students. Per the AP, authorities say that Ali "raped and molested the students, sometimes repeatedly, from April 2005 to January 2007 after school hours in his car near a Queens high school and at a movie theater."
Ali faces 1 1/2 to 4 1/2 years in prison. One recent graduate told the Sun last year, "It's not a school where you can approach somebody, ‘I'm having a problem.' We told the younger students, ‘Be careful. Don't ever be in a room alone with him, not even the elevator.'" The Archdiocese denied that characterization, noting it had contacted the DA's office quiclky, "No student has ever been suspended or disciplined for bringing forward allegations of misconduct."
