Vuong G. Thuy is the 66-year-old head of the Multi-Cultural Academy Charter School in low-income North Philadelphia. Is this headmaster too harsh of a taskmaster?
When told that students accused him of regularly chasing them from corner stores after school, Vuong G. Thuy did what they said he would do. He denied it.
"I wouldn't say that I chase them," he said yesterday. "I want them to go home, I care for them. That is why I tell them not to hang out at the stores."
Sometimes he scares students by searching their coats and bags. Some students say he even checks receipts to make sure they bought their school uniforms from a certain store. And if Thuy (pronounced Twee) catches a kid with a cell phone, he'll give it back - at the end of the year, for 50 bucks.
In addition, the 66-year-old headmaster of the Multi-Cultural Academy Charter School is stern, loud, intimidating, often accusatory and seldom apologetic. On top of all that, he runs a good solid high school, if standardized test scores and college admissions are any guides.
That's all according to the parents and students who support him. Even those parents who want to oust him agree the school Thuy founded six years ago is educating their children.
Unfortunately for Thuy, civil rights are more important to these parents than solid education, although I missed the day that owning a cell phone, and being able to use in school, was officially designated a civil right. Apparently a lot of the current trouble is because Thuy is refusing to return a cell phone to a student who "mistakenly" brought it to campus, but it's in the student handbook that a $50 is required for the return of the gadget.
Thuy is refreshingly unrepentant:
Thuy says the school district should mind its own business and run its own crime-ridden, failing high schools because his school is safe and successful. A parent survey conducted by the school last month, he says, indicated that 95 percent were satisfied with the school...
In addition to [an] audit, an investigation is under way, said Alice Heller, head of the school district's charter school office. The probe of the charter, she said, was sparked by about 30 parent complaints against Thuy in just the last year and a half.
Things like expelling students for chewing gun and charging students for textbooks and activities.
Ah. Chewing gum. Another civil right.
Thuy, in his cluttered, second-floor office, breathes heavily when speaking of the allegations against him.
"What is a civil right? Does it mean that [students] have the right to scream and yell and insult me, and I have no right to kick them out of my room?"
Thuy, a native of Vietnam and a former Temple University education professor who holds a Ph.D. in linguistics, says the district is jealous that his was the only charter high school in the city last year that met new federal rules for making adequate yearly progress. The district, he said, should not attack such a school to side with disgruntled parents and their unruly children.
Thuy's students are 98.3% non-white. He has 18 years of teaching non-English-speaking students under his belt. Teachers say that working for him "is a dream." No cops are needed on campus because there's so little violence. And in 2001 and 2002, 100% of the school's seniors graduated and went on to college.
Here is a partial list of his rules. Would you consider these to be violations of your child's civil rights?
Failure to meet the school requirements for correction of academic deficiency or behavior may deprive a student of the privilege to be re-enrolled for the new school year.
Gum chewing is considered to be a serious offense. The third time a student is caught with gum, he or she is expelled.
Nonrefundable class dues must be paid before a student is enrolled or re-enrolled for the new school year. Ostensibly used to cover student activities such as trips and dances, the dues are as follows: ninth- and 10th-graders, $30; 11th-graders, $70; 12th-graders, $200.
A student who does not bring all textbooks to school is not admitted to school that day and is given an unexcused absence.
Cell phones and other electronic devices will be confiscated and then returned to the parent or owner of the confiscated item at the end of the school year only upon payment of a $50 storage charge.
In order to maintain a safe and orderly environment, periodic random searches will be done that may or may not include all students. The school staff also has the right to conduct searches of student coats and/or lockers.
Students absent on the day the required IOWA standardized test is given must pay a $25 service charge to take the test if they do not have a doctor's note.
Update: Philadelphia Daily News reporter Ronnie Polaneczky says Headmaster Thuy "rocks":
I think the guy rocks. And if more principals in this city felt permitted to do what Thuy does - enforce his school's rules like they actually mean something - our kids would be better for it. Instead, the subject of Thuy's leadership was called into question at yesterday's meeting of the School Reform Commission, which is investigating charges that Thuy runs a too-tight ship.
Granted, it certainly seems unusual for Thuy to charge fees for make-up tests, or to deny awards to students whose parents fail to attend the awards ceremony, which has been alleged.
But what can't be ignored is that Multi-Cultural is working. And you can't tell me its rigorous environment has nothing to do with its success. Standardized test scores are rising. The graduation rate for seniors was 94 percent last year, 100 percent the year before.
And violence is a nonissue.
What's more, Thuy's teachers - 96 percent of whom are certified - rave about the man. And a school survey puts parent-satisfaction rates at 95 percent.
If you ask me, we shouldn't be calling Thuy on the carpet. We should be rolling one out for him.
Posted by kswygert at February 18, 2004 05:40 PM