the auditorium for their monthly delegate assembly meetings. Under the
new rental procedures, this was all done through the principal’s secretary
at the beginning of the school year, reserving the space for one meeting
per month.
In October of an election year, a teacher showed Ms. Valletta the
agenda for the next week’s delegate assembly meeting. Scheduled to
speak was the Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate, the wife of a
former president. The chancellor’s regulations expressly forbid the rental
of any school space for political reasons.
Ms. Valletta called the UFT liaison and explained this auditorium rental
was cancelled because school space was going to be used for political
purposes; she informed the superintendent of this. It should be noted that
the mayor of New York City at the time was a Republican.
Shortly after her call to the UFT liaison, the principal received a call
from the public relations department of the chancellor’s office saying that,
as per the chancellor himself, the rental was to be permitted. The chancel-
lor had been assured by the UFT that the candidate was coming to speak
to its delegate assembly as a parent concerned about education, not as a
political candidate. Ms. Valletta was no neophyte. She had her secretary
pick up the extension and had the chancellor’s representative give his
name and repeat his message as she copied everything down. This infor-
mation was immediately faxed to the superintendent.
The UFT meeting was a grand old political rally, with buttons, straw
hats, and flags all over the place. There were no repercussions for the
principal.
A corollary to letting people do their jobs is the old adage “If it ain’t
broke, don’t fix it.” In an age where we are trying to homogenize educa-
tion and instruction, this is difficult to do. Mr. Chen served as assistant
principal and principal in his Brooklyn high school for over twenty years.
After so long a time, he knew the strengths and weaknesses of every staff
member. He knew who would teacher-dominate a lesson, who would have
a wonderful peer-mediated lesson, who would differentiate instruction,
who would make cutting-edge use of technology. Like any principal, Mr.
Chen knew he was supposed to always look for student-centered instruc-
tion, but, to be honest he did not. He had learned as a teacher that no one
method of instruction is appropriate for every class or every topic.
74 Chapter 6