Problem Teacher Had Won Arbitration

Setting aside the question of why on earth is this woman teaching 7 year olds....

[Kathleen] Borgia arrested shortly after 9 a.m., after a police officer working a construction detail Monday morning noticed a white Mustang swerving in traffic and a witness called the police to report a white Mustang traveling erratically on Hope Street, Contente said. A patrol unit that saw the vehicle on Hope Street stopped the Mustang at State and High streets, Contente said.

Borgia has been back teaching second grade since the beginning of this school year, according to Andrew Henneous, a lawyer for the Bristol Warren School Committee. Her case is in the midst of an appeal, he said.

The School Committee fired Borgia in September 2008 for alcohol-related issues, and she appealed that decision to the American Arbitration Association, which reinstated her job in June, according to Henneous. The School Committee has appealed that decision, and the case is pending in Superior Court, he said.

Borgia has violated her probation on an earlier charge, Contente said. Borgia pleaded no contest in the fall of 2008 to a charge of violating a restraining order, according to Contente and court records. That case was filed for one year on Oct. 8, 2008. She was ordered to undergo batterers intervention and to have no contact with the victim, according to court records.

Borgia also pleaded no contest in August 2004 to a charge of felony domestic assault that was reduced to a charge of domestic simple assault, according to Contente and court records. She received a deferred sentence of five years and was ordered to undergo domestic-abuse counseling and alcohol counseling, according to court records.

Is this the sort of sound decision making we can expect from arbitrated teacher contracts? If neutral arbitrators will go to this length to give the "benefit of the doubt" to a teacher with an apparent history of alcohol-dependency and violence, what the heck will they do if they're allowed to decide on potential contract disputes between teacher unions and school committees? Methinks the ballyhooed "arbitration process" ain't quite as cut and dried as proponents would have us think.