Teacher lodged earlier complaint

TeWinkle Middle School, which will soon be under investigation by the

federal Office for Civil Rights, was the subject of a second

discrimination complaint earlier this year. Enrique Ode, a former

teacher at the school, contacted the office in March saying he had

been denied a job as punishment for being too outspoken.

In March, the Newport-Mesa Unified School District contacted Ode

to inform him that he would not be retained as an employee for the

2005-06 school year.

Ode, a probationary teacher, filed a complaint with the Office for

Civil Rights shortly thereafter, claiming that Principal Dan Diehl

had terminated his employment because Ode disagreed with him about

the district’s English-learner standards.

Last week, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission --

which Ode said had taken over the case from the Office for Civil

Rights -- dismissed Ode’s complaint, saying that it could not find

enough evidence of discrimination.

The ruling noted, however, that the district may have acted

wrongly and that Ode may file a lawsuit within 90 days.

Ode, a part-time continuing education administrator at Santa Ana

College, said he was considering taking further legal action against

the Newport-Mesa district.

“My future is shot,” he stated. “When you go to a new school

district and tell them you’ve been released, that’s a red flag.”

Ode’s handwritten complaint, mailed to the Office for Civil Rights

in March, takes the form of an extended attack on Diehl, whom he

accuses of being “very aggressive with the teachers” and having a

“vindictive nature.”

In January, the principal gave Ode a negative evaluation for

speaking Spanish to his students and deviating from the class

curriculum. According to Ode’s statement, Diehl dismissed him in

retaliation for having disputed the remarks.

Diehl declined comment on the matter, calling it a private

personnel issue.

In the evaluation, which Ode provided to the Daily Pilot, Diehl

gave the probationary teacher unsatisfactory marks on two teaching

performance standards.

The principal’s written comments declare that teachers should

instruct in one language “to prevent students from tuning out English

and waiting for the Spanish translation,” and that Ode, during the

time Diehl visited his classroom, was conducting an exercise not

included in the English-learner textbook.

In a response to Diehl, Ode countered that using Spanish was

necessary to translate directions for beginning students and that his

lesson, while not directly taken from the book, covered the same

material.

While Ode admitted that he did not know the exact reason for his

termination, he wrote in his complaint that it seemed “obvious” that

his rebuttal to Diehl played a part in it.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission did not return calls

seeking comment.

Ode was not the only probationary teacher that TeWinkle let go

this year.

Richard Salamone, a math teacher in 2004-05 who did not teach

English-learner classes, said he also had a personal conflict with

Diehl and could not say whether the principal had singled out Ode for

treatment.

“It was obvious he had picked favorites, and I wasn’t one of

them,” Salamone said of the principal.

TeWinkle, a program improvement school under the federal No Child

Left Behind Act, has had a troubled year, with two different

complaints -- Ode’s, and another filed by parent Mirna Burciaga with

the Office for Civil Rights -- accusing the school of discrimination.

In April, a group of parents petitioned the district in defense of

Assistant Principal Tony Valenzuela, whose job they believed was in

jeopardy. Valenzuela now works part-time at TeWinkle as a community

liaison.