It is this reporter's opinion that it is time to take a look at the plight of a battle-scarred substitute teacher in the Los Angeles barrios.
Her name is Migdia Chinea, a substitute teacher who graduated from UCLA with high honors, is fluent in Spanish, and is a professional screenwriter.
To make ends meet, she began as a substitute teacher for the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD).
After several harrowing experiences, Ms. Chinea now says there is no teaching going on at LAUSD, only confinement – the kind one might find in a penal colony, complete with wardens and bullhorns.
And she says she’s been “confined” at many different schools within central Los Angeles in an effort to prove her point.
She says she’s been insulted repeatedly by students at various schools. She has been harassed, robbed, and pelted with all manner of objects. Her car has been vandalized.
Once, while attempting to teach at a barrio middle school, things got so violent that two other substitute teachers had to be called in to help her.
They, too, were brutalized.
Despite the outrageous treatment, the teachers were instructed not to complain. “Stay quiet. Keep your head down!” they were told.
Ms. Chinea says the schools are often surrounded by criminal street gangs. She tells of having to leave her classroom door open because she feared for her life.
Recently, while attempting to teach at a notorious middle school, she was assaulted by three large young men in front of a class of 53 students. She suffered a concussion and sciatic-nerve damage in the attack, which she says was intended to “terrorize” her.
Ms. Chinea says she's had to intervene several times for younger substitute teachers whose classes consist mainly of illegal immigrant students — here in our country less than three months — who harass the female teachers, often bringing them to tears.
Ms. Chinea tells of violent melees involving hundreds of students that brought in several police squad cars and helicopters flying overhead. She tells of school “lockdowns” as in a prison.
Ms. Chinea concludes that the LAUSD is completely corrupt, inept, and broken with many students having serious behavioral problems and a complete disinterest in learning.
With teachers underpaid and exhausted - many simply marking time until their retirement - they often give out undeserved passing grades to students who can barely write or do math at a third-grade level.
And where are the parents or guardians in all of this mounting chaos?
Ms. Chinea believes recidivist students should be suspended and their parents or guardians should pay a fine.
As for Migdia Chinea and other battle-scarred substitute teachers, these areas of the LAUSD school system should be declared a battle zone and teachers should be given combat pay, she adds.
The offenses put forward by Migdia Chinea have repeatedly been brought to the attention of the LAUSD Superintendent of Schools David Brewer but to no avail, she maintains.
She also believes it is time for the media to acknowledge what is going on: The schools are messy, filthy, dilapidated and without supplies. But most of all, the students are “dangerous, disrespectful, and completely out-of-control.”
“As for me, I am exhausted. I feel exploited and I'm also injured, to boot. It's almost impossible for anyone in my position – in a few short days – to instill in these students any sense of decency, good manners and respect because they should be learning these civilities at home,” Ms. Chinea writes in her WorldNetDaily column.
Migdia Chinea, in describing your harrowing experience and calling attention to this horrendous problem in our schools, you are doing a valuable public service to our community.
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