About that reprimand of Ethnic Studies’ Sean Arce

by David Safier

Here's the basic story: TUSD Assistant Superintendent Lupita Cavazos-Garcia formally reprimanded MAS Director Sean Arce for canceling an awards ceremony for Mexican-American students. Arce wrote a formal response to the reprimand through his lawyer. Cavazos-Garcia then made the reprimand official.

I read Cavazos-Garcia's reprimand and Arce's response. From my vantage point as an outside observer, it reads like administrative she said/he said. Both of them make points that vary from reasonable to stretchers. It sounds like both of them have a bit of right on their side, but the whole thing sounds like small potatoes. In a world free of the politics surrounding Ethnic Studies these days, I doubt if Cavazos-Garcia would have taken the time to put together the reprimand.

With that in mind, let me offer an outsider's analysis of what's going on. (Full disclosure: my sympathies lie with the Ethnic Studies program, which shapes my analysis somewhat, but I think I'm sticking pretty close to what I know about how school districts operate based on my 30+ years in the trenches.)

Before John Pedicone became superintendent, Sean Arce reported directly to the previous superintendent, Elizabeth Celania-Fagen. Pedicone put a buffer between himself and MAS by having Arce report to Cavazos-Garcia. A major problem with that is, Cavazos-Garcia is no friend of the Ethnic Studies program. So Arce's immediate administrative supervisor is something of an adversary.

This indicates two things to me about Pedicone. First, he decided from the beginning he wanted to put some distance between himself and the whole Arizona vs. Ethnic Studies situation. Making Arce answer to Cavazos-Garcia allowed Pedicone more wiggle room. It means he can give non-responsive responses to media questions about Ethnic Studies — he seems to favor vague, non-responsive responses — since he and Arce are separated by a layer of administration. Second, by making Arce's immediate supervisor someone who is antagonistic to the program, Pedicone is making it pretty clear he is not interested in rushing to the program's defense. Far from it. He may hope the program just withers on the vine and goes away, with a little "help" in that direction from Cavazos-Garcia.

In Arce's response to the reprimand, he makes Cavazos-Garcia sound postively hostile to MAS. If these allegations are accurate, they are pretty damning:

You [Cavazos-Garcia] are the one who has violated Governing Board policy and reported to have been disciplined for your comments against the program. In spite of this, you have continued to make negative statements, such as, Latino literature is not American literature or that you advised your counselors to discourage students from taking Mexican American Studies classes. This Spring's low enrollment figures certainly reflect the impact of your directive. Your words and actions provide a context that reveals the pretextual nature of any discipline of Mr. Arce.

Within this context, the most likely reason for Cavazos-Garcia's reprimand of Arce is to help build a case against him. I've seen this many times before. When an administrator wants to silence or get rid of a "trouble maker," he/she builds a case against that person by accumulating a documented list of minor infractions, something that can be done with virtually any employee. Drop enough of those negative pebbles in someone's file, and pretty soon you have a heavy sack-full of reasons to discipline or fire that person.

In this context, the most ridiculous implication in Cavazos-Garcia's reprimand makes sense. She implies Arce canceled the awards ceremony because he doesn't care about recognizing the achievements of Hispanic students in TUSD. Leveling an accusation like that at Arce is so ludicrous, it makes it clear the reprimand is more about retribution than about the cancellation of an awards ceremony.

To the extent my analysis is accurate, it reflects deep divisions between the people in the MAS program and the upper level administration. Unfortunately, that kind of division makes Ethnic Studies in particular and TUSD in general easier pickings for their enemies in the state legislature and the Department of Education.