Nobel Principal Mirna Diaz Accused Of Stealing
Did principal steal $35K? Chicago Sun-Times
Her attorney, Steven Hunter, said Diaz has paid back $23,000 and plans to pay back the rest. "We expect that when the trial is concluded, and both sides have been heard, that she'll be exonerated,'' he said. "There were extenuating circumstances.''
Chicago Public Schools principal accused of stealing $35000 Tribune
Sullivan's office launched a sixth-month investigation into Diaz Ortiz after an anonymous tipster alleged to school officials that there had been financial improprieties at the school.
Thanks to that one tipster who had the guts to come forward!
Does that mean Diaz is bad?
No. Just that there needs to be a change at that school because there became a culture of ownership and no oversight. This lead the principal to believe she was above the law or was the law.
All powerful.
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
Shame on you Olga and Trujillo for letting it get this far...
Well I guess this principal is a superstar. Doubling the test scores, now that is a superstar principal.
Why? Because the former Curie principal school was on Corrective Action. BINGO.
Myself, I think she should do time for insisting on being the star of all her school musicals....
I'm not a Crook!
The imposition of the Daley dictatorship beginning in 1995 created an entire new dimension of corruption here in Chicago, however, one that continues at the highest levels of government, education, journalism, and philanthropy to this day. Now that it's begun to unravel, the troubling thing is that it will take at least a decade to straighten out some of the mess that's been left, and much of it will never be repaired. The damage has just been too great.
As the foremost whistle blower inside CPS during those years (forget the official narrative and think about the facts, for a minute), I've taken this kind of story seriously.
We've published on several iterations of these kinds of straightforward "corruption" stories across the years, but the bigger picture belies most people's imagination. And, of course, many many decent people are simply in denial.
Who, for example, is ready to listen carefully to the in-depth story of all the corruptions (money; sex; criminal) that reside within the Aspira charter school mess, to take one example that's still ongoing? The same Sun-Times that punched up the headline on Nobel's Diaz helped Aspira cover up some of its corruptions at Aspira Haugan two years ago (next month) and continues to facilitate similar ones across the city.
How many people are willing to listen to a narrative that outlines the destruction of Gladstone Elementary School and its building's conversion to quasi-private use (UIC/Noble Street) through overtly racist tactics against the black children and families (and staff) currently at Gladstone?
The question about Nobel is not why it's going on but what took it so long to become "news."
Teachers from Nobel have tried (amid fear) to blow the whistle for almost a decade, and the embezzlement was just the tip of an iceberg that included nepotism (noted above) and other kinds of serious corruption, way beyond what's noted here and going back through all of the years of Arne Duncan and into the years of Paul Vallas.
At bottom in all this is that insane "bottom line" that is so goofily highlighted in both the Tribune and Sun-Times narratives about the latest Nobel nonsense: as long as Diaz raised test scores, she was immune (a la Enron, until things completely unravelled) from serious audits (especially of her test scores games) because she was producing according to the only metric that matters (present tense, not past) to the top dogs around Arne Duncan and to each of the seven members of the Chicago Board of Education.
That's the real corruption, and it's embedded into the very fabric of CPS now that we're completing the 13th year of corporate "school reform" under Richard M. Daley and his appointees (CEOs, Board, elsewhere across CPS). As long as Chicago defines "superstar" as "high test scores" and then grants immunity from scrutiny to anyone who achieves those objectives, the people who rise to the top will be the most corrupt in the system, and the corruption below them will be covered up until it blows up in someone's face.
During the years before the Daley dictatorship, I exposed a large number of corruptions, ranging from the highest ranking predatory criminal ever to operate in a public school (James Moffat) to numerous minor league potentates across CPS. We also took on the Marva Collins hoax long long ago.
The imposition of the Daley dictatorship beginning in 1995 created an entire new dimension of corruption here in Chicago. That level of corruption is one that continues at the highest levels of government, education, journalism, and philanthropy to this day. Now that it's begun to unravel, the troubling thing is that it will take at least a decade to straighten out some of the mess that's been left. Much of the mess will never be repaired. The damage has just been too great, and the lives of thousands of children -- almost always the "least of our brethren" -- have been destroyed.
As the foremost whistle blower inside CPS during these years (forget the official narrative and think about the facts, for a minute), I've taken this kind of story seriously. (I also continued to ask to have my status changed to whistle blower from copyright infringer, but that won't happen until a regime dedicated to justice returns to Chicago).
Back to Nobel. We've published several iterations of these kinds of straightforward "corruption" stories across the years. The bigger picture belies most people's imagination. And, of course, many many decent people are simply in denial.
Who, for example, is ready to listen carefully to the in-depth story of all the corruptions (money; interpersonal; criminal) that reside within the Aspira charter school mess, to take one example that's still ongoing? The same Sun-Times that punched up the headline on Nobel's Diaz helped Aspira cover up some of its corruptions at Aspira Haugan two years ago (next month) by joining Channel 44 and the leaders of Aspira in slandering a teacher who tried to blow the whistle. So that corruption continues to facilitate similar ones across the city.
Looming behind all this is that Chicago is America's most intensely and nastily segregated city. The pretense for the Olympic rivals that of China, with its human rights violations. How many other major American cities can brag that they contain more than 300 segregated all-minority (i.e., 100 percent minority children) public schools, and that the city is creating more of them each year, only now through privatization ? (Most of the charters created in the past five years are all-black or all-Latino, so Chicago has been adding a new dimension to segregation).
How many people are willing to listen to a narrative that outlines the destruction of Gladstone Elementary School? In February 2008, CPS votes to close Gladstone for "underutilization". Then in March 2008, CPS votes its building's conversion to quasi-private use (UIC/Noble Street) through overtly racist tactics against the black children and families (and staff) currently at Gladstone?
The question about Nobel is not why it's going on but what took it so long to become "news." It's also an epistemological question: just what do we mean by "corruption" in a city where you can drive for 20 miles and pass nothing but public schools which are 100 percent black? Fifty years of Daleys have created that, but the complicity of most of the people at the top levels of power has been necessary.
This is not to say that the microcosm isn't relevant.
Teachers from Nobel have tried (amid fear) to blow the whistle for almost a decade, and the embezzlement was just the tip of an iceberg that included nepotism (noted above) and other kinds of serious corruption, way beyond what's noted here and going back through all of the years of Arne Duncan and into the years of Paul Vallas.
At bottom in all this is that insane "bottom line" that is so goofily highlighted in both the Tribune and Sun-Times narratives about the latest Nobel nonsense: as long as Diaz raised test scores, she was immune (a la Enron, until things completely unravelled) from serious audits (especially of her test scores games) because she was producing according to the only metric that matters (present tense, not past) to the top dogs around Arne Duncan and to each of the seven members of the Chicago Board of Education.
That's the real corruption, and it's embedded into the very fabric of CPS now that we're completing the 13th year of corporate "school reform" under Richard M. Daley and his appointees (CEOs, Board, elsewhere across CPS). As long as Chicago defines "superstar" as "high test scores" and then grants immunity from scrutiny to anyone who achieves those objectives, the people who rise to the top will be the most corrupt in the system, and the corruption below them will be covered up until it blows up in someone's face.
This woman's brain only works in deception. She sleeps with whom she needs to sleep with, pays who she needs to pay, and fires who she needs out of the way to help herself wirh the children's money. Go find her! She's not very smart but she will outsmart you in deception. She believes in her shredder!
Let’s try to get a figure for what the average High School student spends
Inside the school every year. Remember to include lunch. vending machine
Game tickets and dances. This will very by year of course, but let’s try
http://www.catalyst-chicago.org/news/index.php?item=1778&cat=30
The "Turnaround" office wasn't in the current budget when it was presented last summer, and now it's one of the biggest things facing the schools.
While it's important to root out "corruption" at the local school level (and anybody could have stopped Diaz a long time ago, so the real question is why they didn't), to turn away from what's going on in the 5th, 6th, and 7th floors at 125 S. Clark St. is the really expensive -- and really corrupt -- reality in Chicago's public education system today. The seven members of the Chicago Board of Education treat public money as if it were a private piggy bank to fund their ideological experiments (latest: "Turnaround". Previous: all the "Res" -- reconstitution, reengineering, and intervention).
Beyond the waste of hundreds of millions of dollars on these silly experiments in Chilean "free market" nonsense, there is the intellectual corruption of reducing the complexity of children (and the hundreds of thousands struggling in poverty in our world class city) to a "bottom line" as measured by multiple choice computer graded secret so-called "standardized" test scores.
Anyone who thinks the Inspector General is going to investigate even one hundreth of Arne Duncan's corruption is in fantasyland.
These kind of charges and such are not done over-night.
Concerned teachers, staff, parents, and those of us (me) that have loved ones employed by CPS have indeed been reporting this for a while now. But as with all things having to do with the government, things are slow motion.
No one is in a hurry to look into such things when there are layers upon layers of red tape. It's akin to a stinky onion, you peel off one layer to only get to another. Sadly, a lot of people in the positions of power in CPS that can and ought to be investigating and stopping these kinds of crimes are either protecting friends and or do not care to do the work involved.
Especially not when they know they will receive their pay every two weeks.
Many on other websites have stated that she did a lot of good to try to justify her crimes. That is tantamount to saying that Saddam was a good leader even though he tortured and murdered countless millions.
I am NOT comparing Diaz to a murderer, no. But the analogy is the same - we can't sit idle and excuse crimes because of some good that was done.
Are we to teach our kids that it is OK to have extra-marital affairs (i.e. Bill Clinton) if we are a charming speaker?
Are we to teach our kids that it is OK to steal money if we are going through a rough patch in our lives?
Those that are trying to sweep the 42 charges brought against Diaz need to think about what they're trying to have us consider and justify.
A wrong does not make a right.
She can plead "not guilty" all she wants, but these kind of charges are seldom ever brought to light unless there is a plethora of evidence as its foundation.
Maybe she will have to go through the receiving area of the Cook County Jail.. then onto Division 4.
The irony.....
What do you mean?
YOU ME THAT PERSON HAS DONE MORE BAD THEN GOOD.





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