Chicago to target absent teachers

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S AT U R D AY , F E B R U A R Y 4 , 2 0 0 6
159TH YEAR — NO. 35  CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Chicago
to target
absent
teachers
4 priests
protected
by bishop
Red Sea ferry disaster
$10 million spent
annually by district
for classroom subs
Deposition reveals
Imesch found jobs
for abusive clerics
By Tracy Dell’Angela
and Darnell Little
Tribune staff reporters
Driven by parental concerns
about teacher absenteeism, the
Chicago Public Schools for the
first time will start scrutinizing
schools with high numbers of
teachers taking sick days.
The district also plans to publicize teacher attendance rates
at each school beginning next
school year.
“This is important to parents.
There’s never been a spotlight
on this, and that’s a mistake,”
Schools Chief Arne Duncan said
of the new scrutiny, which was
announced to schools in a memo
this week. “I think it’s like any
workplace. When people feel
good about the work, people
want to be there. This is not only
important for student learning,
it’s important to school culture.”
On any given school day in
Chicago, an average of 1,500
teachers, about 6 percent of the
teaching staff, call in sick or
take a personal day, according to
a Tribune analysis of teacher
payroll records. The absentee
rate is highest on Fridays, when
an average of 1,800 teachers
don’t show, the analysis revealed.
While
some
individual
schools track teachers’ attendance, the district has never tried
to analyze how many teachers
are out systemwide—or whether some schools have a disproportionate number of absent
teachers.
For each of the last six school
years, Chicago teachers missed
an average of 12 unscheduled
days in their 39-week work year.
Their current contract calls for
10 sick days and three personal
By Crystal Yednak
Tribune staff reporter
Joliet Bishop Joseph Imesch
said a priest he worked with in
Michigan had confided that he
sexually abused an altar boy
there, but Imesch felt no obligation to tell authorities who were
investigating the incident, according to a 2005 deposition.
In the deposition, which was
unsealed this week, Imesch
adds new details to the record of
how he and the Catholic Diocese
of Joliet handled several priests
accused of abuse.
The Michigan priest, Rev. Gary Berthiaume, admitted the
abuse to Imesch after he was arrested but before he was convicted of molesting the boy, according to the deposition. Berthiaume was sentenced to 6
months in prison in 1978.
Years later, Imesch invited
him to work at a retreat house in
the Joliet diocese.
Asked in the deposition why
he didn’t report Berthiaume’s
Some of the 324 survivors (above) arrive
a cargo ship Saturday after a ferry carrying more than 1,400 people sank Friday
in stormy weather in the Red Sea. Officials have begun investigating the disaster involving the 35-year-old vessel Al-Salam Boccaccio 98 (right) that was making
the 120-mile trip to Safaga, Egypt, from
Getty/AFP photo by Yvan Perchoc
Hamas’ creed:
Govern clean
By Joel Greenberg
Surprise fall in jobless rate
Tribune staff reporter
The nation’s unemployment
rate unexpectedly declined last
month to 4.7 percent from 4.9
percent, the lowest level since
mid-2001, as the job market continued to strengthen, a Labor
Department report indicated
Friday.
“The economic expansion has
matured to the point where cor-
PLEASE SEE BISHOP, PAGE 4
A West Bank city’s progress—corruption rooted
out, services for the people—offers a glimpse of
the agenda for the next Palestinian government
at the Egyptian port of Hurghada aboard
Duba, Saudi Arabia. STORY, PAGE 6
By James P. Miller
admission to police, Imesch
said:
“Well, I don’t think that was
my responsibility. He is charged
with a crime. He has to be given
a trial. My going to the police
doesn’t have anything to do
with whether he’s guilty or
not.”
The deposition is part of a law-
AP photo by Ben Curtis
PLEASE SEE ABSENT, PAGE 5
Unemployment dips
to 4.7%, the lowest
level since mid-2001
Tribune file photo
Bishop Joseph Imesch’s deposition in a priest sex abuse
case was unsealed this week.
porate America feels it’s safe to economist Haseeb Achmed,
staff up,” said Clear View Eco- “reinforces the case for continnomics economist Ken May- ued Fed tightening.”
land.
The decline in unemployment
The decline in the jobless rate is “probably going to spook marwas welcome news for most of kets more than any other recent
the country. But on Wall Street, data,” echoed Wells Fargo sewhich recently has begun to nior economist Eugenio Alehope the Federal Reserve is man.
done or nearly done with its
The jobs report jarred the
long series of interest rate stock and bond markets Friday
hikes, there were worries the morning, but the impact eased
latest data might spur the cen- as the day progressed. The Dow
tral bank to continue raising Jones industrial average was
rates.
down as many as 73 points beStrong demand for workers fore closing 58 points lower, at
can send wages higher, fueling 10,793.62.
inflationary pressures. And FriThe Labor Department’s
day’s upbeat employment news,
noted JPMorgan Chase & Co. PLEASE SEE JOBS, PAGE 5
Hiring strengthens
Tribune foreign correspondent
The nation’s unemployment rate
fell to 4.7 percent in January, the
lowest level since July 2001.
QALQILYA, West Bank—Pulling a wad of bills from his pocket, Hashem al-Masri, the acting
mayor of this town, showed visitors his monthly salary, just
paid in cash.
“I don’t even take this,” he
said. “I give it to people who
need it.”
Al-Masri, 44, a well-off pharmacist, is affiliated with the
militant Islamic group Hamas,
as are all 15 city council members in Qalqilya. They were
elected to office last May in a
sweeping Hamas victory in local elections.
The man at the top of Hamas’
slate, Wajih Qawas, is in an Israeli jail, so al-Masri serves as
acting mayor, running this town
of 45,000 near the West Bank’s
border with Israel after more
UNEMPLOYMENT RATE
Seasonally adjusted, monthly data
January:
4.7 percent
7%
6
5
4
2000 ’01
’02
’03
’04
’05
’06
Source: Labor Department Chicago Tribune
than a decade of rule by the longdominant Fatah party.
Since taking office, al-Masri
has made changes in style and
substance that could be an indication of Hamas’ agenda when it
forms a government after its
landslide victory in the recent
Palestinian parliamentary elections.
To begin with, al-Masri has instituted an open-door policy. His
office, decorated with a green Islamic wall hanging and a picture of Yasser Arafat, is easily
accessible. On a recent afternoon, a man with a pressing
problem simply knocked on the
door and came in, discussing
his business with the acting
mayor, who was fielding a steady stream of phone calls.
The city bureaucracy appears
to have been streamlined.
PLEASE SEE HAMAS, PAGE 5
INSIDE
‘It really is a very rich text. I would say this is the single
most important literary work to come out of the New World.’
N AT I O N
NU professor sides
with Iran’s president
—Allen Christenson, director of a project to digitize the Popol Vuh
Newberry’s ‘Mayan Bible’
draws experts, immigrants
By Oscar Avila
Tribune staff reporter
In a secluded corner of the
Newberry Library, archivists
slowly take apart the yellowing
book considered the Mayan Bible for its epic narrative of the
Sovereign Plumed Serpent and
other gods creating the world.
Like other Newberry treasures over the years—a Shakespeare first folio, letters from Columbus—the Popol Vuh attracts
scholars.
But unlike any other rare text
at the library, the Popol Vuh also
draws immigrants from Guatemala and Mexico, descendants
of the Mayans who make their
Professor Arthur Butz
supports views by Iran’s
president that the Holocaust
never happened. PAG E 3
way to the library so they can
reverently page through the 188page book full of elegant script,
in Spanish and the Mayan language of Quiché.
As researchers from the Newberry and Brigham Young University transfer the book’s contents to CD-ROM, they also recognize that the world’s oldest
known Popol Vuh manuscript
remains a sacred document that
many visitors will want to see
and hold in the printed form.
The restoration of the book,
being done at the same time as
the CD-ROM project, will make
the Popol Vuh sturdier for visPLEASE SEE MAYAN, PAGE 2
SPORTS
Full circle? Former Bull
may return to Chicago
Antonio Davis could rejoin
Bulls after the Knicks traded
him Friday to the Raptors.
Weather: Flurries; high 30, low 19
Index, Page 2
Online at chicagotribune.com
Tribune photo by José M. Osorio
Robert Karrow shows the Newberry Library’s text of the Popol Vuh, famed for its Mayan creation epic. The 18th Century book is being restored and its contents transferred to CD-ROM.
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CHICAGO TRIBUNE
ABSENT:
Substitutes
don’t fill all
vacancies
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
days.
By comparison, salaried employees nationwide take an average of five sick and personal
days during their 50-week work
year, according to a 2004 survey
of 536 employers by a major human resource consulting company.
The district’s effort is an attempt to address the academic
disruption that occurs in
schools with large numbers of
teachers calling in sick. But it
also is expected to reduce the
hiring of substitutes, which
costs the cash-strapped system
more than $10 million a year.
Last school year, the district
tapped 280,000 substitutes, with
the peak coming in February,
when demand for substitutes
topped 47,000—or about 2,350
F R O M PA G E O N E
SECTION 1
‘If teachers are feeling that level of stress, then the
question needs to be why and what can we do to
relieve it.’
—Schools Chief Arne Duncan, commenting on reasons for teacher absenteeism
each day. The demand for subs
in the 2005-06 school year is even
higher, up about 27 percent for
the first five months of this
school year compared with the
same period the year before, according to district reports.
The absentee problem falls
hardest on students in schools
perceived to be dangerous or
chaotic because their schools
have the toughest time securing
substitutes, principals say. In
May, an average of about 200
substitute requests each day
went unfilled, which meant that
the school had to find another
staff member to cover the classroom. Stable schools typically
have their own stock of steady
substitutes and don’t rely on the
district’s substitute center.
Union officials contend that
the district is unfairly trying to
punish teachers for taking days
that are guaranteed by the contract.
“The district is using this as
an intimidation tactic,” union
President Marilyn Stewart said.
“Teachers may take off for a lot
of reasons, either because they
are sick or frustrated. It’s no
one’s business. I don’t see why it
has to be public. Why do parents
care, if it’s not tied to test
scores? You can clean your
house without letting everyone
see your dirt.”
Stewart argued that most Chicago teachers are dedicated professionals who are working under heavy stress and are not
misusing sick time. She blamed
the high absentee rates in certain schools on principals, who
contribute to teachers’ stress
but do little to manage their
staffs.
One principal agreed, saying
the new policy stigmatizes
schools without addressing
some of the underlying reasons
that drive teachers to call in sick
even when they are not.
“There are a lot of things com-
S AT U R D AY
ing down from the central office
from people who have no idea
what it’s like to be in a classroom with 32 children and an
unsupportive principal,” said
Christina Gonzalez, principal of
Zapata Academy on the Southwest Side. “Absences create
chaos in the classroom and it
creates chaos in the building.
And of course you don’t want
teachers to be absent. But I don’t
think this is fair. I really don’t
think most teachers abuse it.”
Duncan said the idea is not to
shame teachers, but to spot
schools where the absences suggest a deeper morale problem.
“If teachers are feeling that
level of stress, then the question
needs to be why and what can
we do to relieve it,” Duncan
said.
Some school leaders favor the
public attention because it
lends weight to their own scrutiny of teachers suspected of misusing sick days.
At Otis Elementary, Principal
James Cosme tracks his teachers’ attendance yearly and looks
for excessive absences that
can’t be explained by a long illness or family emergency. In a
typical year, he may call in three
teachers—out of his staff of 50—
to discuss excessive absences.
Usually it works, but sometimes
it doesn’t. He once had a teacher
who frequently called in sick on
Mondays, which Cosme suspected was caused by a drinking
problem. He ultimately decided
to dock the teacher’s pay, and the
teacher retired soon after.
Cosme also makes a practical
appeal, urging teachers to conserve their sick days and bank
them in case they need them in
coming years for an unexpected
illness. Or they can cash them in
at the end of their career for a
richer pension.
Even though he’s paying attention to the issue, he welcomes the extra scrutiny.
“Anytime you shine a light on
something, it forces self-examination,” said Cosme, who said
that in a typical year his teachers average six to seven sick
days. “It will be interesting data
because I don’t know how well I
do compared to other schools
like mine.”
At Bethune Elementary, Principal Charlotte Stoxstell is already one step ahead of the district. She sends out notices to
teachers every month or two, detailing their attendance and
punctuality rates. When it dips
below 95 percent, the teachers
are “reminded” they are falling
short of the school’s improvement goals.
And she tries to set a good example, taking care of her personal business in the evening or
the weekends. At times, she
even covers a teacher’s classroom when he or she calls in,
which is usually embarrassing
enough to discourage frivolous
absences, she said.
“I do fuss at them, but I don’t
just focus on the people who are
out absent,” she said. “I give it to
everyone and I salute those who
come every day.”
tdell’[email protected]
[email protected]
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FEBRUARY 4, 2006
Tribune file photo
Bishop Joseph Imesch has led the growing Joliet diocese, with
620,000 Catholics in seven counties, for 26 years.
BISHOP:
Parishoners’
statements
also unsealed
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1
suit filed by a man who alleges
another priest, Rev. Edward Stefanich, sexually abused him in
the 1960s. The 268-page document had been sealed, but the
Tribune and the Illinois Coalition Against Sexual Assault
asked that it be released and DuPage County Judge Stephen
Culliton ruled to unseal it on
Thursday.
The diocese fought to keep the
document from being made public, arguing its release allows
the case to be tried in the media
before any ruling could be made
on evidence.
On Friday, the diocese referred all questions to a spokesman, who said church officials
had no new comment.
Imesch, 74, who has been bishop in Joliet for 26 years, has
come under scrutiny in the past
for his handling of sex abuse allegations. In the deposition,
Imesch conceded that after he
received credible allegations of
priests’ misconduct, he allowed
at least four priests to continue
in the ministry.
Berthiaume was one. After
his conviction, Berthiaume
worked in Cleveland for a time
before Imesch brought him to
Joliet, according to the deposition. Imesch said he restricted
Berthiaume from dealing with
young people.
But Berthiaume also served
as a chaplain at Good Samaritan
Hospital in Downers Grove. After media reports revealed Berthiaume was serving at the hospital, he was removed in April
2002.
Imesch insisted in the deposition that there had been situations since 2002 in which the
diocese referred abuse allegations to civil or law enforcement
authorities. But under questioning, he was not able to provide any specifics.
When Imesch was asked the
name of one priest he had reported to authorities, he said he
didn’t remember. That started a
contentious back-and-forth between Imesch and attorney Jeff
Anderson.
“ . . . I’m struggling with why
you can’t remember who it
would be in connection with . . .
” Anderson said.
“Well, I certainly couldn’t
give you all the names and I’m
not going to dwindle them out
one by one,” Imesch said in the
deposition. “You expect me to
remember every allegation that
came. That’s—maybe you can
do that. I can’t.”
Imesch then said he had other
things going on at the time.
“What other things do you
have going on that are more important than bringing this—an
allegation of sexual abuse to a
priest—by a priest to the police?” Anderson asked.
“The death of a priest,”
Imesch answered.
“OK. Besides that,” Anderson
said.
“The death of a parent,”
Imesch said.
“OK. Besides that,” Anderson
said.
“And (sic) altercation in a
parish,” Imesch said.
“What kind of altercation is
more important than reporting
sexual abuse to law enforcement?” Anderson asked.
Imesch also disclosed that another priest, Rev. Anthony J.
Ross, admitted to him that he
had abused a boy. Again, Imesch
said he did not report the information to police. The abuse allegedly took place in the early
1980s.
“In this particular instance I
know that the couple (the parents) did not want any publicity,” Imesch said.
Ross continued to write to the
boy, according to the deposition.
The parents met with Imesch
about the priest’s letters.
In 1993, Ross was transferred
to the diocese of Santa Rosa, Calif., where he served in detention
ministry. After church officials
there learned of his past problems, Ross was suspended, said
Deirdre Frontczak, a spokeswoman for the Santa Rosa diocese.
Ross requested a canonical
trial, which resulted in church
officials permanently suspending him from serving as a priest,
she said.
Also
unsealed
Thursday
along with the deposition were
reports from parishioners that
the diocese received in 1979. One
was from the parents of a 20year-old woman who were concerned that Stefanich was seeing their daughter.
One confidential memo states
the two had been seen “necking” in a parking lot. Parishioners were gossiping about the relationship. The diocese questioned Stefanich about it, but he
denied anything was happening, according to the deposition.
In the mid-1980s, Stefanich became involved with a 14-year-old
girl. After receiving reports
about the relationship, the diocese asked Stefanich about it,
but he denied anything was going on. The documents show
that Stefanich was not suspended from his duties until his arrest on sexual abuse charges. In
1987, he pleaded guilty to criminal sexual abuse.
Also released with the deposition was a letter from one victim
to Imeschin whichthe writer
states that in the future, Imesch
should support the decision of
families to go to the police and
should not tell the family to forgive the abuser.
Tribune staff reporter David
Heinzmann contributed to this
report.
[email protected].
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