On November 19th, my supervisor shocked me by revealing that he was extremely unhappy with me. He had never mentioned this before. He had never indicated any problem at all. Suddenly, he was telling me that I was in danger of failing my professionalism rating, a threat I had just heard two days before from Dr. Lotan when she was talking about my classroom management plan. He told me that I thought I was already such a great teacher that I needed no correction, and that as a result of my arrogance and resistance, he was going to require me to do forced observations. For that reason, he said, he was shifting my secondary class so that I had no reason not to do observations. His stated goal was to stop me from attending an algebra support class, a class of students who struggle with math, because he felt that two classes were enough (I work three classes, one more than most STEP students).

[Supervisor] gave me an extraordinarily low rating in professionalism, despite having never mentioned any problems in email or verbal communication throughout the entire quarter. Moreover, when I provided a log of all my observations, he accused me of lying, saying that I had lied before that point and certainly could be lying again. He repeated this charge in front of [the director of placement] who saw nothing unusual about it, and then again in front of [cooperating teacher], my cooperating teacher, who was shocked. Only after noticing [cooperating teacher's] stunned reaction did [Supervisor] acknowledge that perhaps he was using an unfortunate term in saying that I lied.

Based on the sequence of events, I inferred that [Supervisor] secretly met with [cooperating teacher] and emailed him privately encouraging him to prevent me from attending the algebra support class. He also apparently stated that both Dr. Lotan and [director of placement] were concerned about my professionalism, even though I had met with both of them earlier that week and neither of them talked about professionalism in any other context than my classroom management plan—and in fact, explicitly denied that they had discussed anything with [Supervisor] other than his being “at a loss” as to how to deal with me. I stated these inferences to [Supervisor] in our 12/3 meeting, and [Supervisor] tacitly confirmed them.

My supervisory meetings of 11/19 and 12/3 were both extremely upsetting, as I had no reason to anticipate any problems. In both meetings, [Supervisor] raised his voice to me several times, as did I in response, although I said nothing abusive. During our meeting of 12/3, I kept noticing [Supervisor]’s eyes flickering towards the door and I turned around to see Dr. Lotan and [placement coordinator] standing outside the door listening. I got up and closed the door; [placement coordinator] later used her key to enter anyway. I told her that [Supervisor] had just told me I lied, and she instantly blamed me for not being calmer. She also said that I was an extraordinary “hassle”, and that no principal would want to hire anyone who caused so much trouble.

Dr. Lotan never directly mentioned either meeting to me and never met with me about my problems with [Supervisor] in any way. She included the 11/19 meeting and my behavior on a list of “concerns” she had that I was unsuited for teaching (see next section). In holding me responsible for the meeting of 11/19 without ever asking me for an account of the events, Dr. Lotan is violating the Guidelines for Reviewing Concerns Regarding the Suitability for Practice of Teaching (henceforth referred to as Guidelines), which state “If the concern can be explained or corrected in a mutually satisfactory manner, the matter need go no further.” I was given no chance to explain that I was extremely distressed, that [Supervisor] raised his voice to me several times, and that I was upset by the underhanded nature of my supervisor’s treatment.

As Dr. Lotan had held me responsible for the problems in my meeting of 11/19, I documented [Supervisor]’s charge of lying in a letter on December 3rd. Dr. Lotan never responded to that email. In our meeting of 12/10, I specifically brought up [Supervisor]’s treatment, as I was tremendously upset by it. Dr. Lotan and Dean Callan both indicated the following:

• Neither of them saw anything inappropriate about my supervisor accusing me of lying. My supervisor has enormous power over me, and is one of the three people who must recommend me for a credential (as is Dr. Lotan).
• Neither of them saw anything unusual about [Supervisor] meeting secretly with my cooperating teacher, or emailing him about concerns that no one had even mentioned to me.
• Both of them told me that [Supervisor] had changed my secondary class because of his belief that I spent too much time tutoring and “well, maybe there was something about observations”. [Supervisor] himself, who told me exactly why he was switching my classes in front of my supervisory partner, flatly contradicts this. He never mentioned any concerns about the type of work I did in my algebra support class. As I already work in the class that became my secondary, any such concerns were largely a formality—I worked two large classes that had a lot of direct instruction, and one in which I did more one-on-one tutoring. What each one was called was largely irrelevant. Had [Supervisor] told me he just wanted to switch my classes without impacting my teaching, I would not have objected nearly as vehemently, although I still would have been upset at not having been consulted.

Supervisors are supposed to act as trusted mentors who support teacher candidates through their first year of teaching. Instead, I am forced to meet weekly with a man who sneered at me and said I had lied, who told others he was dissatisfied with my work without ever mentioning it to me, who met secretly with another evaluator to complain about me and work to coordinate a surprise reprimand. Moreover, he gave me a low evaluation despite clear evidence provided that I had more than met the baseline criteria. I can’t ask for a new supervisor for fear that Dr. Lotan would cite my request as evidence I can’t work with people. STEP staff have removed supervisors for far less intrusion. One supervisor was removed because he helped students at a placement site while participating in an observation.