Charter school settles retaliation suit
Female teacher who cited retaliation will get $125,000.
Harmony Public Schools has agreed to settle a federal civil rights complaint brought by the U.S. Department of Justice on behalf of a former Austin teacher.
Harmony Public Schools, the state’s largest charter school system, has agreed to settle a civil rights complaint brought by the U.S. Department of Justice on behalf of a former Austin teacher.
The complaint, filed this week in federal court in Austin, states that a female art teacher at the Harmony Science Academy-Austin in 2010 had asked to be paid commen- surate to her male colleagues and then lost her contract after complaining the school discriminated against women and Americans.
Founded by Turkish immigrants, Harmony employs Turkish teachers under the H1-B visa program, which allows a school to hire foreign teachers if it can demonstrate there are not enough qualified American applicants.
The visa program required Harmony to disclose the pay information so the art teacher, Nicole Tuchscherer, knew her male colleagues from Turkey were being paid somewhat more than her own $40,000 salary. A database of H-1B visa salaries shows another art teacher making $42,000 at the time.
“Harmony’s decision to not renew Tuchscherer’s employment contract was because she complained of national origin and sex discrimination,” according to the complaint.
And the school violated the Civil Rights Act when it retaliated against Tuchscherer because she opposed the wage discrimination, the complaint continues.
The settlement agreement calls for Harmony to pay Tuchscherer $125,000 for damages and back pay and for Harmony’s Austin schools to provide information and training about its anti-discrimination policy to employees.
“Harmony Public Schools denies any wrongdoing and nothing in the consent decree should be construed as an admission of wrongdoing by Harmony,” Scott McLellan, a lawyer for Harmony, said in a statement.
No court found any wrongdoing on the part of Harmony, McLellan added, but the school agreed to resolve the case because “the expenses of ongoing litigation for Harmony would have been signif-
icant and impacted educational budgets.”
Tuchscherer no longer lives in Austin and could not be reached for comment on Thursday.
Since 2000, the Houston-based Harmony has quietly grown into an ex- pansive network of public charter schools focusing largely on science, engineering and math. It now operates 40 campuses statewide, including five in the Austin area, and serves about 14 percent of Texas’ 178,000 charter school students.
Harmony has earned a national reputation for
I told her I thought it odd that somebody would call from Rocky Mount, N.C., to tell me about a candidate’s sexual orientation. Despite what caller ID said, she said the call didn’t come from Rocky Mount. And she wasn’t allowed to tell me where it did come from, making it an undisclosed location. I should have asked her to put Dick Cheney, who’s openly had a change of heart, on the phone.
At that point, it occurred to me the call might have been financed by somebody who thought it was a bad thing that Brown is openly gay and that perhaps that data point might dissuade me its rigorous math and science curriculum and last year won a coveted $30 million federal grant aimed at customizing instruction for each student.
Despite the schools’ academic success, Harmony has attracted conservative critics who have raised concerns about its Turkish con- from voting for him. No, she said, the call was paid for by the Brown campaign.
Brown, who Tuesday lost his bid for the Democratic nomination for the Precinct 2 seat on the Travis County Commissioners Court, told me Thursday that if I would not have interrupted, the caller would have told me things about him other than his sexual orientation. But why, I asked, was that the first thing?
“I just think that any time that history can be made, that that should be pointed out,” Brown said. “What’s the difference between me saying that and Sarah Eckhardt saying she’d be the first woman county judge?”
Good point, well-made, though I tend not to vote based on gender or sexual orientation.
And Brown added that being openly gay is “not the most important thing” nections. They say the charter school network is tied to a controversial Muslim cleric from Turkey and has questionable business practices. Harmony’s superintendent, Soner Tarim, dismisses such claims. about him. “I have much more qualification than just being the gay guy in the race,” he said.
But it was the first thing the caller told me and that puzzled me. Maybe I should’ve shut up and listened, but I wanted to note that I don’t vote based on sexual orientation.
As usual in such situations, I kept the call going on as long as I could. This was more fun when my children were young and enjoyed gathering around to watch Dad’s nut-guy-onthe-phone act. I cherish those moments as among our best bonding experiences. I hope someday if becomes something they can enjoy with their kids.
Alas, I used to be better at this. The supervisor hung up fairly quickly. Too bad, because I never got to tell her I already had openly voted. are $45, and a Lou Reed tribute show featuring Alejandro Escovedo, Suzanne Vega and many more costs $30. The tickets — available through the Paramount’s website at austintheatre.org — do not guarantee admission. Money will be refunded if the shows reach capacity with badgeholders, wristband wearers or other ticket holders.
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