Missouri teacher sues to stop billionaire Rex Sinquefield’s attacks on public education

NEWS RELEASE

From the Missouri National Education Association
1810 E. Elm St., Jefferson City, MO 65101

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 9, 2012

For further information: 
Chuck Hatfield
Stinson, Morrison, and Hecker
(573) 636-6827

(Jefferson City, MO) – Today Chris Guinther, a teacher on leave serving as President of the Missouri NEA, filed suit in Cole County Circuit Court against Rex Sinquefield’s proposed Constitutional Amendment that would radically alter student evaluation and school funding.

“Billionaire Rex Sinquefield views children as pawns to be used and discarded as part of his continued extreme attacks on working families and their public schools. We have seen the real Rex Sinquefield and his hostility towards children, parents and teachers in our public schools whose work he related to a Ku Klux Klan conspiracy. He is plainly out of step with Missouri values,” said Guinther.

Guinther is referring to a presentation at Lindenwood University where Sinquefield made called public schools a KKK conspiracy and demonstrated a lack of understanding of how student and teacher evaluations currently function in Missouri. The video can be found here: http://youtu.be/w1z4OYxjOjg  

Guinther continued, “It’s time for Missouri to think bigger, invest in our kids and give them the resources they need to achieve their personal best. That starts with well-trained experienced teachers. Rex Sinquefield’s proposed Amendment would force schools to waste over one-billion dollars teaching children to fill in small dots on a standardized score sheet. That is not the way forward.”

Attorney Charles Hatfield of the firm Stinson, Morrison and Hecker, represents Guinther. Among other items the suit alleges that ballot summary is fundamentally flawed and the Auditor’s fiscal note fails to properly disclose the billions of dollars in cost the initiative will have.

The 35,000-member MNEA represents teachers, education support professionals, college faculty, retired teachers and students studying to be teachers in school districts and on college campuses throughout the state. It is the Missouri affiliate of the 3.2 million-member NEA.

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