Speech costs grad: Valedictorian who ripped school denied diploma
We feel that her schoolmates are deserving of an apology. It was a celebratory day for all of them.
- Education Department spokesman Stephen Morello
Sometimes, given the adults that kids have to deal with, I'm truly amazed that children leave high school with anything resembling an education. You might question the appropriateness of the forum, but sometimes it takes making people uncomfortable to pay attention to a problem. Such was Tiffany Schley's dilemma. When do you play the game as you're expected to, and when do you stand up and say enough is enough?
The valedictorian of a Brooklyn high school was escorted out of the building and denied her diploma yesterday because she trashed the school in a scorching graduation speech.
The school says it won't give Tiffany Schley her sheepskin until she says she's sorry - but the 17-year-old is unrepentant.
"I was speaking for my peers," Tiffany told the Daily News. "We've been living with this for four years."
A top student who's going to Smith College on a full scholarship this fall, Schley was brutally honest about the High School of Legal Studies during Thursday's graduation ceremonies in Bushwick.
Among her gripes: The school has had four principals in four years, overcrowded classes, a shortage of textbooks and other basic materials, unqualified teachers, unstable staffing and uncaring administrators who refused to meet with students to discuss the school's problems.
"They always want to keep the problems hush-hush, but what goes on in this school is real," said Tiffany, who was also the editor of the school newspaper, yearbook chairwoman and a member of the student council....
When Schley came to school yesterday to pick up her diploma with the rest of her classmates, she and her mother were told they had been disrespectful and were escorted out of the building.
Her mom, Felicia Schley, was furious at the way she and her daughter were treated and remains proud of Tiffany.
"She busted her behind to get there, she kept it clean and she was honest," her mother said. "Sometimes the truth hurts."
Sometimes you have to stand up for what's right. Sometimes you have to be willing to say what needs to be said, consequences be damned. Doubtless Ms. Schley knew that her words would not be well-received by administrators, but if students can't talk about the truth, what's left to talk about?
If Martin Luther King had stuck to preaching on Sundays, would there have been a Civil Rights movement? If Mahatma Gandhi has stuck to practicing law, would Britain have exited India in 1947? What is so wrong with shining light on what you know to be the truth? After living with the situation for four years, and seeing that the administration did not care about student concerns enough to even meet with them, why not call them out? Why not make them uncomfortable? Why not shine some light on the problems? Clearly, in Schley's mind, nothing was going to change unless someone brought the problems out into the open.
You'll notice that at no time did Spokesman Morello address the concerns raised by Ms. Schley. I suppose it's easier to treat her as a recalcitrant child than to deal with the problems that exist. If Ms. Schley was so terribly out of line, why can't administrators address the issues she raised? Perhaps because they know she's right? If they can't argue on the merits, the next best option is to discredit the source as a rabble-rouser and a malcontent, no?
In the end, Ms. Schley's most useful lesson will probably be what she takes away from this sorry little episode. Don't rock the boat, and the people in power will love you. Play the role, and you'll go far. Speak the truth, and you'll be vilified as a heretic. Four years of high school, and THIS is the lesson she takes away from it all. How terribly sad.
It's been said that those who can do and those who can't teach. Having taught myself, I would certainly dispute the veracity of that statement. What does seem to be without dispute in this case is this: those who can do neither become administrators. What a shining example for our children.
