Malverne School District cleared in teacher discrimination suit

A federal jury unanimously found that race didn’t factor into the Malverne School District’s decision not to promote an African-American teacher or reassign him an additional class, the district reported last Thursday. The decision was handed down in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York in Central Islip on Dec. 9.

Kenneth Smith, 49, a current Malverne Middle School math teacher, had sued the district, Superintendent Dr. James Hunderfund and Assistant Superintendent Rose Ricca, charging them with discrimination when another teacher became the middle school dean in 2008, and when an additional math class was not reassigned to him while another math teacher was on maternity leave in 2010.

“We are grateful that the jury carefully examined all the evidence and came to what we believe was the correct decision,” said Hunderfund.

Two similar discrimination cases filed against the district and its administrators are pending a trial date. One involves Lakeview resident Sherwyn Besson, a former business teacher in the district, and the other, Betsy Benedith, 45, of Brooklyn, who was an assistant principal in the district.

Bea Bayley, president of the Lakeview chapter of the NAACP, said she was disappointed by the ruling, adding that she believes the school district makes it a practice to turn away African-American teachers. “In a school district that’s predominantly black, students are seeing no black leaders,” said Bayley. “The only place they’re going to see a black adult is in the cafeteria.”

Bayley said that, as part of her involvement in the NAACP, she has presented African-American candidates to the school district when there have been job openings over the past 18 years. In recent years, she said, she has rarely been notified of teacher job openings. “I’ve only been informed of positions for a janitor, part-time substitutes and security guards,” said Bayley. “I have not gotten any posting for teachers or administrators from the school district’s clerk.”

Hunderfund, however, said that the school district hired three African-American teachers in the past year and “combed the universe” to find them. He added that 12 percent of Malverne teachers are black, compared to the makeup of other Nassau County districts, where the average is 5.2 percent, according to recent Newsday research. “There’s just not a lot of people around,” said Hunderfund, who added that Malverne is one of the lowest-paying districts in Nassau County. “Plus the vast majority of people in education are white females.”

Multiple calls to attorney Steven Morelli, who represented Smith and will represent Bessson and Benedith in their upcoming trials, went unanswered.