March 7, 2008
Breaking: Rhee Fires 100 D.C. School Employees
WTOP is reporting that today D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee used her newly gained authority to eliminate jobs at the DCPS central office to fire at least 100 nonunion employees. The employees will be placed on administrative leave until March 22, and include no current teachers or school staff.
D.C. Protective Services Police was called to DCPS headquarters to escort the fired employees from the building and keep the peace should there be any disruptions or outbursts. The DCPS central office is often criticized as inefficient and bureaucratic, and Rhee has previously threatened to eliminate central office jobs. The number of employees fired constitutes nearly a quarter of the jobs Rhee has power over under the authority granted her by the D.C. Council.
The Post is quoting an anonymous DCPS official:
"Terminations are intended to allow DCPS to discharge its administrative functions efficiently with the appropriate number of people and to address performance concerns," the official added.
If D.C. was waiting for a sign that Rhee was serious about overhauling the D.C. schools system from the top down, this was it. Now let’s hold our breath for the backlash.
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how soon until 825 north capitol is engulfed in flames, surrounded by trebuchets manned by the disgruntled ex-DCPS employees?
Those trebuchets will be no match for Michelle Rhee's
Hwacha!
This is awesome! Now if only we can fire police officers who play video games on the job.
Yay!!!! Gratuitous references to Civ IV: Warlords!! Yay!!!!
Yay!!!! Gratuitous references to Civ IV: Warlords!! Yay!!!!
You should hear the shrieks of outrage over WaPo.com. Must be nice to live in a world where you can still muster shock and outrage over being let go from a job.
lmaoooooooooooooo
Rhee=Anton Chigurh with a cattle poke firing pink slips thru brains...
My friend thinks Rhee is hot. She's not bad....just has one of those "teeth always showing" mouths.
I wonder what the rest of DC thinks....
In any case, it will be interesting to see how she takes the heat. I know I'm in her corner.
From the WashPost -- "One senior manager, a five-year veteran of the school system...asked her what was the reason for the termination..."
Uh, hello. Rhee's firing people. And you're an idiot.
you go girl!
98 down. Hundreds more to go.
My favorite WP commenter comment was the one warning of a surge in violent crime in DC because these 98 people were fired.
Apparently if you are fired from your do-nothing government job your only recourse is to mug people for a living?
Hilarious.
"My favorite WP commenter comment was the one warning of a surge in violent crime in DC because these 98 people were fired."
I'm not sure about this. Would these 98 still commute in every morning from PG County to commit the crimes?
Damn! I was wondering if and when the axe was going to, but this is pretty dramatic. I'm getting a tingly feeling in my pants at the thought of DCPS saving $5M (100 x 50K, just a rough guess) in salaries.
I'm wondering how much of the 5 mil will end up defending dc against spurious wrongful termination suits.
Are they eliminating people or positions? If the latter, I got a feeling that position will soon be farmed out to a contractor, at a higher salary most likely. If the former, at least they can't hire someone worse to fill the position.
Or can they...?
Are they eliminating people or positions? If the latter, I got a feeling that position will soon be farmed out to a contractor, at a higher salary most likely. If the former, at least they can't hire someone worse to fill the position.
As a contractor, I'm always amazed at the perception that we're so well paid. Even in a situation where my salary is higher than a gov't employee who does a similar job, I'm usually doing the job of 3-4 gov't workers.
Depends on the contract. I've worked Fed and contractor, and they both have their share of why-does-this-person-still-have-a-job types. I was with a healthcare contractor that paid me entry-level squat, yet racked up serious billable hours for "overhead" (i.e., the secretary that was banging the boss). But DoD contracting puts them all to shame (cough-BoozAllen-cough).
And it's not like DC has a great history with no-bid contracting in the first place.
"As a contractor, I'm always amazed at the perception that we're so well paid. Even in a situation where my salary is higher than a gov't employee who does a similar job, I'm usually doing the job of 3-4 gov't workers."
Yeah, and we often work above grade as well. There's some major idiocy at the upper ranks of government administration. I've been on plenty of contracts where the only difference between the contractor who did the job and the client who took the credit was thirty years and a penis.
And monkey, I think Booz Allen must include a course on "looking busy yet producing squat" in its corporate training...gah.
lukfarang - Someone has been breaking the First and Second Rule of Contracting Club.
This is your final warning.
And monkey, I think Booz Allen must include a course on "looking busy yet producing squat" in its corporate training...gah.
No doubt. On my last contract those fuckers came in, got paid, and produced a report that duplicated the recommendations that we had already made. I felt like I was taking crazy pills.
Did DCPS ever get a new payroll computer system? There's another one where the contractors came in, put a report together, slapped some software together, found out it didn't work, and left a multimillion dollar bill. They ended up going with the "legacy system" that consisted of a 1950s-era mainframe held together with toiletpaper tubes and pieces of feces.
DCPS should go back to using pneumatic tubes. That would be pretty cool, actually.
I saw the media gathering outside the DCPS HQ last Friday evening. I was wondering what was going down. Nice that the media was alerted to the mass firings. And did anyone read Gary Imhoff's ridiculous rants into today's issue of The Mail? My God! It's like he never heard of the concept of at-will employment. Rhee's firings were arbitrary and capricious! They were mean-spirited! She's gonna fire more people without justification! Wah! Wah! Wah!
The DCPS employees received notice, will get paid for 2 weeks, and have a nice vacation at home during those 2 weeks. If they were all in IT, then I imagine that if they're competent - big IF - they will get hired somewhere else. Now, if it turns out they can't get hired, then what does that say about their IT skills and competence?