Teacher fights to regain job Fort Kent school dispute divides SAD 27 community

FORT KENT – Teacher Daniel Fishman has no continuing contract with SAD 27 and taught his last class at Community High School on Wednesday in the midst of a controversy that includes his allegations of discrimination made to the Maine Human Rights Commission.

Fishman has appealed the decision on his contract and is seeking the assistance of Maine’s education commissioner and Gov. John Baldacci’s office.

The controversy was the cause of two student walkouts at the high school last month, as students sought to have Fishman reinstated.

James Raymond, the senior class honor essayist, in an unapproved speech made at graduation earlier this month, labeled the decision not to rehire Fishman a bad one for students and called for a change in the superintendency of the district.

A petition, which reportedly contains 400 names of SAD 27 residents seeking the firing of Superintendent Sandra Bernstein, was presented Thursday to the superintendent.

“There is nothing I can legally do at the local level,” Fishman said Tuesday. “I have run the gamut locally, and the bottom line is that the superintendent has the right not to recommend a teacher for hiring.

“I filed an allegation of discrimination, intimidation and harassment with the Maine Human Rights Commission last week,” he added. “I have also asked [Education Commissioner] Susan Gendron to investigate what is happening in Fort Kent.”

Fishman, 53, has been teaching French and Spanish at Community High School for two years. Bernstein did not include his name on the list of teachers nominated for continuing contracts last month. The school board accepted the list May 2.

The teacher has a bachelor’s degree in two languages and a master’s degree in education, and has taught 13 years over the past 30 years. He says he has not been given a reason that his contract was not renewed.

Peggy Carson of Oxbow Plantation, one of four applicants for the job, has been hired to teach Spanish, a position for which Fishman applied. She also teaches mathematics.

Bernstein, reached Friday, said the Fishman issue is done and she could not discuss it because it is a personnel issue.

“He was not rehired,” she said.

Fishman said the petition he mailed to Bernstein, with his appeal of not being rehired, comes from an informal committee, but he does not know who started the petition on his behalf.

Kathleen Bowers was the group’s spokesman last week, but she was not allowed to speak at the SAD 27 board of directors meeting June 13. Neither Bowers nor Cecilia Pinter, chairwoman of the SAD 27 board, could be reached Thursday or Friday.

Fishman mailed copies of the petition to Gendron’s and Baldacci’s offices.

Fishman claims many SAD 27 residents are afraid to get involved because Bernstein and her husband, Martin Bernstein, who is executive director of the Northern Maine Medical Center at Fort Kent, employ as much as half of the population of the area.

The teacher claims SAD 27 residents feel they are not represented by the school board and that it isn’t listening to them.

John Kittredge, a member of the human rights panel support staff, said Thursday that he did not have Fishman’s petition on the open cases or intake lists.

“That does not mean it has not been filed,” he said. “It may only be in the initial stages of the process.”

Greg Scott, legislative liaison in the Department of Education, said Thursday there is little Gendron’s office could do in the matter.

“His complaint is that he was a probationary teacher and he was not recommended for a continuing contract,” Scott said. “The decision is local and it is not debatable.”

Scott said the state has no role, authority or jurisdiction in the issue, and Fishman has been told it is completely a local personnel matter.

Scott explained that a request for an inspection of SAD 27 would need either a petition signed by 60 percent of the parents of children in a school, a request by the school board or a petition of 20 percent of the registered voters in the entire school district.

“I have applied elsewhere for a teaching position, but I wonder if I am not blackballed now,” Fishman said. “It is very discouraging for myself and for students.

“I am not looking for fame or glory. I just want my job,” he said. “I am the central focus of the controversy, but the problem is much larger.”