On Day 4 of detention, still not giving up Hope

HOPE MOFFETT, the banished Audenried High School teacher, spent her third day in a teacher dungeon yesterday - waiting in limbo to learn if and when she can return to her classroom.

A scheduled "investigatory conference" set for yesterday was postponed, and neither Moffett nor the teachers' union are sure when it will happen.

So Moffett, 25, said she will again report today to what teachers call the "rubber room," where they're sent to await rulings on disciplinary matters.

Moffett has been a vocal critic of the district's unilateral decision to turn Audenried - a school at 33rd and Tasker streets in Grays Ferry that opened less than three years ago - into a charter under the Renaissance Schools initiative aimed at helping to turn around low-achieving schools.

Students protested the decision and walked out of school on Feb. 15 to rally outside district headquarters.

Two days later, Moffett was told that she was reassigned from Audenried and to report to the High School Academic Division offices at Strawberry Mansion High School, on Ridge Avenue at Susquehanna. She's spent her days since alone in a basement room "in solitary confinement."

Moffett said she was told by district officials that she endangered students' safety by giving them SEPTA tokens to attend the protest and that she "incited" the students to "riot."

She was given a letter this week telling her she faces discipline for disobeying a directive from the district last week "not to discuss" her reassignment to teacher jail. Instead, she wrote an opinion piece in Tuesday's Daily News.

A school district spokeswoman said again yesterday that the district doesn't comment on personnel issues.

Meanwhile, a teacher-activist organization, Teacher Action Group, plans for teachers, students and community members to rally outside school district headquarters at 4 p.m. today.

Mary del Savio, a graduate student active with TAG, said yesterday that teachers districtwide are afraid to speak out about not having a voice in school-reform issues.

Del Savio said that other intimidation tactics are being used against teachers because of recent protests by students at three schools that will undergo major changes next year. In addition to Audenried, there have been protests at West Philadelphia and Martin Luther King high schools. The teachers in all of those schools will have to reapply for their jobs, and only half will be guaranteed positions.

Del Savio said teachers are afraid to go public with their criticisms because they're worried their jobs may be on the chopping block with more than $400 million in budget cuts looming next year.

"It's a real culture of fear," said del Savio, a former teacher. "So the rally [today] is to come out and say in numbers, 'We're not going to go back in our classrooms in a state of fear.'

"We want to be heard and stand in solidarity with the students and the parents who don't want teachers to be afraid in just doing their jobs."