To the editor:
As a former English teacher, I was appalled and outraged by the recent decision by the Caribou superintendent and the school board to fire Kirsten Albair. This decision sends a clear and frightening message to all the teachers in the Caribou school system: you have no voice, no rights, no real recourse and definitely no support from the powers that be. Lower your standards so you won’t ruffle any student’s feathers, make no demands of your students, set no deadlines or due dates for assignments, take no risks in you classrooms, and, above all, make sure you have a witness to anything you say or do when students are present.
Any and all of you are potential targets who could be singled out at any time. Anything you say can be taken out of context and used against you, as it was with Kirsten.
When your integrity, education and experience have no relevance and the integrity, education and experience of your co-workers who come to your defense do not matter; there is something definitely wrong with the system. At least four of Kirsten’s colleagues testified at the “hearing” in her defense, all of who’s professionalism I greatly admire, yet their voices were not heard. Admittedly, they were listened to but not heard.
With over 100 years’ of experience among them, their professional opinions should have carried some weight, but their expertise was not only overlooked, it was ignored. It almost seems to me that the decision had already been made and that the “hearing” was simply a ruse to cover their backs lest some further litigation might ensue.
In their zeal to oust Kirsten Albair, I’m not sure either the board or the superintendent considered the consequences or ramifications of their stupidity. The entire situation was grossly mishandled from the very beginning, starting with the superintendent and continuing with the high school principal. Once the board became involved, it seems as if McElwain pulled the strings and his puppets responded as expected.
The immediate outcome of this situation is that a cloud of fear, mistrust, anger and resentment now hovers over the staff of the Caribou system, at least at the high school, although I can’t imagine that any teacher in the system isn’t affected. When a student’s accusation is believed over trained, educated and experienced professionals, no one is safe.
I wonder how these teachers will feel as they walk back into their classrooms next week, knowing that their every move is now suspect. It has to impact their teaching as well as their interactions not only with their colleagues and the administration, but also with the students.
In the 1950s, Arthur Miller wrote the play entitled “The Crucible” dealing with the Salem witchcraft trials. This whole scenario is reminiscent of the witch hunt he describes. In Miller’s words, “Is the accuser always holy now? Where they born yesterday as clean as God’s fingers? I’ll tell you what’s walking Salem – vengeance is walking Salem. We are what we always were in Salem, but now the crazy little children are jangling the keys of the kingdom, and common vengeance writes the law. You know in all your black hearts that this be fraud.”
And this brings me now the accuser. Miller describes the accuser in “The Crucible” as a “lump of vanity.” I fear the same is true here. A desire for vengeance, the means and the tools to attain it and the willingness of adults to believe have not only lost Kirsten her job, but also her teaching career. And that is a shame. She is a passionate teacher who loves literature, loves the written word, loved her job and loved her students. Unfortunately, none of that matters now.
The bottom line here is that there’s a great deal of shame to be assimilated by those involved. Shame on you school board, shame on your superintendent and principal and shame on you the accuser for setting out to ruin someone’s life! I am sickened by what I have seen transpire here. However, a valuable lesson in life is reinforced: When the truth can be twisted and manipulated to suit the accuser’s pretext, truth no longer has any meaning, especially when vengeance is the motive and vindictiveness is the stimulus.
Caribou
