I told you so, teachers

I told teachers long ago they would need collective bargaining ability to influence the policies and decisions of education officials. Now the very teacher who was so adamantly against me is in need of the power I once laid at the feet of all teachers but they refused to pick it up. I guess they didn’t realize that I was ahead of the times on their representation and a lot of other things in the CNMI, which is why I keep saying, “I told you so.” The fact is, many teachers are going to lose their jobs and this fiasco with teachers and Mr. Garrison is something I forewarned teachers about but they didn’t listen.

While I have not always agreed with Mr. Garrison, I do know that he is more than qualified, he cares about the school system, and he cares about the welfare of our children, which are my paramount concerns. I also know for a fact that Mr. Garrison is putting MHS on a better course for improvements by raising the expectations at MHS. While the concerns of teachers may have some validity, I’m sure it is more about how he got rid of these teachers than the reason. But teachers have known since I was the Teacher Rep. that expectations have risen and that they must be able to perform at the new level or else, so it is no surprise to see Mr. Garrison raise the bar of expectations at MHS.

In fact, Mr. James Yangetmai was the leader of the ACT group that worked with certain BOE officials to get rid of me, ruining teachers’ chances to have real power on the board. So it is not surprising to see Yangetmai reap what he has sown. I find it poetic justice. Even though ACT kept me from accomplishing my goal for teachers I remained professional and left my vengeance up to God; He just delivered in grand style! I say this because I can clearly remember Yangetmai making a promise to me and then Governor Babauta to unite teachers so teachers could get their collective bargaining rights. Instead Yangetmai and BOE officials did everything they could to assassinate my character and kill my attempts to help teachers. The sad part for teachers is that they were successful.

Mr. Yangetmai should have learned a long time ago that PSS is autonomous and taking his complaints to the Legislature is futile. Only the governor can influence education through the teacher representative, who is appointed by the governor, and there hasn’t been a teacher rep since I refused to run again because I was tired of trying to help people that didn’t want to be helped and I knew the present governor wasn’t going to do anything! Now look, teachers don’t even have a rep on the board. It should be noted that since my employment with PSS in 1992, Governor Babauta was the only elected official to truly try and help teachers. He is also the reason our school system is autonomous and protected from the Legislature, the governor, and politics. Hopefully, the next governor will take a page from Governor Babauta’s playbook when it comes to education.

As for taking a complaint about the school system to the Legislature, it is really a waste of time unless it’s about changing the law. What got me was that PSS officials were even smarter by not coming to the public hearing, which would have only given the complaint more credibility and made matters worse. Even though I don’t agree with all the methodologies, I can tell the commissioner and principals are doing all they can to improve the quality of education and there will be casualties that might have been avoided to a large extent but there will always be casualties or some form of cost for improvements—philosophically, nothing is free and everything comes at a cost!

The only real solution for teachers is to claim your U.S. constitutional right to bargain and forget all the other stuff; it is a waste of time.

P.S.: One day I will also be able to tell the Board of Education “I told you so” as teachers still don’t have a teacher rep and their rights have even been taken out of the CNMI’s Constitution but thank God there are federal laws that still guarantee teachers their rights to “bargain” with the CNMI Public School System. CNMI teachers are the only teachers in America that are not exercising their right to bargain, thanks to Mr. Yangetmai and ACT but you can be assured that one day teachers are going to claim this right, which is why I sing the song Time is on My Side! Yes it is, when it comes to proving my point and shutting up the mouths of my critics!