Thursday Night

Ms. Diaz was PAID to leave New York, she was PAID to leave Bridgeport, CT (when she already had a job lined up in Florida- further throwing salt on the wounds she created in our inner city's school system), she was PAID to leave Florida.... and you now are PAYING her to leave your school system! This woman is very highly paid and rewarded for her inept handling of school systems. We in Bridgeport were duped into hiring a female, minority, Harvard grad--- sounds like a good hire and you probably were convinced it was too-- but someone needs to warn others about this person. We are still suffering from some policies she instituted and it will take a decade to recover from the ills she inflicted here. By the way, has anyone ever noticed how she would walk up to people and try to use her position to intimidate them simply by fixing their tie or adjusting their collars-- like a mother to her children?

In Bridgeport, she observed classes and had her husband tag along - and allowed him to ask questions of the children and staff. Risking the wrath of the left for hammering a female minority... please help others avoid the problems you faced by passing along a warning to those interviewing her in the future! MIGHT someone please track her next attempts to interview for another educational post and forward the warnings?

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This is also posted at Heath Haussamen's blog after reading lots of comments that support Diaz:
Folks, its time for a little critical thinking. I know it’s hard, and we all want to go back to watching Dancing with the Stars, but pull out your thinking caps and sit still a minute before you jump to any conclusions here.

In this situation, it is best NOT to use a TV interview with Diaz as the decisive means of determining if she has your support. We all need to look at facts, documented history and evidence presented through the testimony of those who have worked with her, who I assure you, are not all crazy, selfish, petty people. Where there is smoke, there is fire, and it appears there is a WHOLE LOTTA SMOKE pouring out of Ms. Diaz's tenure, and now she is trying to do damage control before too many people see it.

I suggest those who are interested GOOGLE the definition of sociopath. You will find that sociopaths are not all serial killers and criminal masterminds. Sometimes they exist relatively normally among us, like the book says, "Next Door". Like many personality or mental disorders, people can have a cluster of traits of sociopathy as opposed to a full blown case, and yet still function in society, even though most who know them feel like something is wrong, something is missing from their characters. As a matter of fact, the more educated and the higher the socio-economic status they are in, the better they come off as normal, and can rationalize what they do ( remember OJ Simpson, Jack Abramoff, the boys at Enron anyone?).

What they are extremely good at is conning people: presenting themselves, depending on the setting, in a way that is charming, intelligent, and attractive. It is a form of shape shifting they use to manipulate people in order to go about their business. Like a used car salesman, they size up the characteristics of their audience, what they want to hear, what makes them vulnerable to their lies, and then portray that. TV is their best medium to accomplish this.

It’s important to not allow yourself to be conned, but to demand answers to substantive questions about this woman's past, her time here, and what we can expect for our future if our board continues to be so negligent in their oversight of our school system.--I personally searched out most of this information about Dr. Diaz and the other candidates during the hiring process. I then e-mailed all of the pertinent information to every school board member. As a teacher I am very tired of the financial resources being wasted on head hunters who are paid by the school board but work on behalf of the applicant. We need to use our heads for something other than a hat rack!

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I hear that the Director of Transportation and the Director of Security regularly serve as Dr. Diaz' personal chauffeur. What a great use of employees - every superintendent should have two chauffeurs - especially ones that are paid about $70,000 per year each! Great use of our directors Dr. Diaz!
By the way, when our security director is driving you around town at your beck and call, who is protecting our kids? Never mind, I forgot, kids are not YOUR priority. My bad!

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Dr. Diaz,
I want to amend my Professional Development Plan as follows:
Goal #4: Do God's work with children!
Is that good with you?

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The admonition to 'Lighten up a little', and my 'Impervious' story were not intended to interfere with anyone's focus... only to suggest that we might pause, take a deep breath, and remember that positive educational progress of EVERY CHILD must be our primary concern. If that commitment requires derailing power-trip, egomaniacal administrators... so be it.