A Lesson in Mismanagement

In a January 23 meeting with Morse, the five teachers laid out their concerns. "It sounded like everything was back to being as bad as it was the first year," Morse remembers. She then paved the way for a meeting during the following week with deputy superintendent for school operations Eddie Pearson.

The most experienced of the disgruntled teachers was pleasantly surprised by what happened next. "We met with Manty on a Monday; by Tuesday, we had [district] auditors in our school. I've never seen anything like it. There were financial audits, curricular audits, [other] audits. The system actually reacted to us."

The Edison Project, too, was quick to react once its higher-ups knew Reeves was again in the district's cross hairs. Edison staffers from New York and elsewhere have been in the school since early February, and much of their work, according to the disenchanted teachers, has clearly been in response to their concerns.

"All of a sudden money started showing up from nowhere," says a second-grade teacher. "We hired six new tutors; each teacher got $45 to spend on supplies; we got the social studies textbooks; they stopped splitting up classes."

The money was no panacea, though. Moses Vazquez, with a cynicism borne of three years at Reeves, says he saw the improvements as the same kind of damage control that occurred at the end of year one. He also noticed that, when school district auditors sat in on classes or roamed the halls, they were almost always escorted by out-of-town Edison Project employees. "It was funny," he notes. "What kind of audit is this when the auditors can't even walk around by themselves?"

Those auditors did note ongoing problems at Reeves. Their program review stated that substitutes could not be found for 40 percent of teachers' absences, resulting in classes being split. "This failure rate is too high," the reviewers wrote. They also pointed out that technology "is severely underutilized." Further the district identified a "communication failure" among staff. "The potential of this project is being lost due to some serious communication problems," the report's preface concludes.

Meanwhile school police were investigating that corporal punishment allegation against Mariefrance Milhomme.

About 30 people, many with children in tow, all wearing determined expressions, are gathered in the conference room of the Unite for Dignity union offices on NW 167th Street. Some are parents of Reeves Elementary students. Others are teachers there. Milhomme's mother and sister are in attendance. Milhomme herself arrives later, but she doesn't speak publicly (or with New Times). And though many others do speak during the meeting, they spend most of the two hours listening to Daton Fullard talk.

Fullard, dressed in a bright red sweat suit and a wide-brimmed, white straw hat, sits on a folding table and holds forth on Milhomme's situation. By this time the State Attorney's Office has declined to prosecute the 29-year-old teacher for child abuse. Some of the parents at this meeting also had been present at Milhomme's April 9 arraignment, at which they wore T-shirts printed with the slogan "Miss Milhomme, We Got Your Back." Fullard is explaining the school district still might bring disciplinary action against Milhomme for her alleged spankings.

None in the group expresses any concern over whether Milhomme actually did beat her students. Their main concern: getting Milhomme back into her classroom. "Like yesterday," snaps one man, a Reeves parent.

Many also wonder aloud how the investigation of Milhomme got started, and some question how school police conducted that investigation. In his calm yet fluid speaking style, Fullard, father of a Reeves student, offers his assessment:

"Some elements inside the school are trying to fight this principal, and some people at Dade County want to submarine this project," he says, referring to the Edison Project. "We're going to get these things handled. We need to see that this school is cleaned out. This school belongs to us, and we want people in there who have our children's best interests at heart."

All but one of those in attendance are black, and many of them are Haitian. When Fullard talks about the "elements" he wants "cleaned out" of Reeves Elementary, it's clear he's talking about Norgan, Vazquez, and the other white and Hispanic teachers who snitched on Milhomme.

Three parents of Milhomme's former students are in the room, and all say they believe the teacher cares about their children. "Miss Milhomme has a passion for kids," says Anita Latson, mother of one of Milhomme's first-graders. "She made my child comfortable in that class, kept me posted on her progress."

Latson says Milhomme's arrest and departure has left her former students distraught. "One Monday the children were whining and crying in class, saying, 'I thought Miss Milhomme was coming back.'"

She adds that whether or not Milhomme was spanking kids, she wants the teacher back in the classroom.