Losing and Winning
Imogene
Redwine was hired as a special education teacher in the Atlanta Public
Schools in 2001. This was a few years
before the Atlanta
schools cheating on CRCT[1]
assessment tests came
to light. She had a
hand in disclosing the scandal, and then she lost.
In 2007 Donell Underdue moved from Connally
Elementary to be principal at Brown Middle School where Redwine taught. Underdue was soon making comments that
Redwine read as encouraging teachers to cheat on the tests[2]. The next year Redwine talked about the CRCT pressure
to a former Brown Middle School principal and a news investigator. When Underdue found out, he reassigned
her. She filed a grievance. She received a poor evaluation because her
CRCT scores were not high enough.
Underdue put her on a performance development plan. She filed another grievance. She complained to Underdue’s boss about
cheating. She was accused of threatening
the assistant principal, which she denied doing.
In 2009 Redwine took FLMA time off for health problems. Her union told her school officials seemed to
be planning to fire her. When she
returned, Underdue assigned her to teach math despite her limited experience in
that area. She objected and filed a
grievance. The following year Underdue
gave her a performance evaluation that threatened her teacher’s license.
In 2011 as the State investigated reports of cheating on the
2009 CRCT tests, Underdue was promoted to Executive Director of Schools. The next year Redwine testified for the
prosecution before the grand jury that considered the cheating. A week later the school system’s legal office
said her contract would not be renewed for the following year. The union intervened, and she received one
more renewal. Then she was out at the
end of the 2013-14 school year.
She
sued the Atlanta school system, and three years later a jury
decided to believe that she had been fired because of her poor performance. Her whistleblowing and support of
investigators were not the cause at all.
After ten years of fighting – including three years in court – she lost. If my attorney
agreement is any indication, Redwine still paid for mediators, court fees,
and other costs even if her attoney worked on a contingency fee. After being fire, she needed months to find
even a lower paying job. Now 62, she
will never fully recover financially from her project.
Weak evidence of crime may have contributed to her loss. She spoke out about cheating, but the problems
at Brown Middle School were not as bad as elsewhere in the 2009 testing. Although she heard about meetings at Underdue’s
home to fix tests, she did not witness the cheating. Underdue skated from one job to another
higher up in Atlanta,
then Chicago and now Florida.
But, as in most states, Georgia
law doesn’t demand the alleged crime be proven. Those who retaliate, though, like to claim
their accusers had things wrong.
HomeFirst did that in its
defense against my complaint.
Unlike the losers, those who win can feel society backs them. Even if the award is smaller than it should
be and you must share it with attorneys, it is easier to feel
vindicated when you win.
For those, like Redwine and me, who win nothing, loss can tempt
us to regret we ever became whistleblowers.
Dan
Bethards lost after he blew a whistle on illegal gun sales by his boss in
the Wisconsin Department of Justice. He lost
his job and his house. He lost his case before of the state Court of
Appeals. Given the choice again, he
would not blow the whistle, he says. The
organization is just too powerful.
Many whistleblowers who are fired by large organizations
engage attorneys. The attorneys deal
with the organization’s lawyers. Settlement
offers are solicited. Money is offered
in exchange for silence. HomeFirst offered
an agreement to me. I’d be surprised
if Atlanta schools didn’t offer one to Redwine to avoid years of legal
expenses.
Whether or not she was offered a settlement, Redwine went
the lawsuit route believing she had a case.
My attorney told me I
had a case too. But I didn’t try
suing after the
settlement disgusted me and the State
of California disappointed me. We
make our choices. Maybe Redwine was more
of a fighter than I was.
We whistleblowers also make choices earlier in the game. We recognize that the organizations we work
for are dicey. They cheat and lie to
others, but they pay well. Well enough,
it seems, as long as it lasts. The thousands
of Wells Fargo bankers – and hundreds
of whistleblowers – who witnessed the creation of fraudulent customer
accounts were well paid. That’s why they
worked at Wells rather than someplace else.
In 2007 Redwine sensed the corruption of Atlanta Public
Schools, but she stayed for the pretty decent salary. I knew years before I was fired that
HomeFirst was ethically sketchy and refused to honestly report
its effectiveness. I knew its CEO
was inept and arguably
an idiot. But I stayed because the
salary was good enough.
When we see a whistleblower lose, it’s easy to find unfairness
in the situation. Redwine’s courage
brought her legal costs, lost wages and emotional stress. But she also took in several years of income
from an organization she knew was corrupt and was targeting her. I did the same at HomeFirst as did those
Wells Fargo bankers.
Organizations like Atlanta public schools, Wisconsin Department
of Justice, Wells Fargo, and HomeFirst are guilty of unjust use of power. But we are not mindless victims.
We won for a while. Many
of us for years. Then we lost the bets
we made. Weep for us only a little. Pity more those who never object at all.
[1]
Criterion-Referenced Competency Test given to all public school students in
Georgia. The test was used to measure
schools’ academic progress as required by the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
[2] By
erasing incorrect responses and marking the correct answers. State investigators would identify cheaters
through erasure analyses that exposed the basis for significant improvements in
school-wide scores.
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