Pinoy teachers in US fight back

WASHINGTON – Hundreds of Filipino teachers in nearby Maryland threatened with deportation though no fault of their own are fighting to hang on to their jobs and stay in the United States.

They held protest rallies in front of the Department of Labor in Washington DC and Maryland’s Prince George’s County Public Schools and warned of a class action suit against the Prince George’s County Public Schools (PGCPS) for “discrimination and unfair labor practices.”

The teachers said they were being unfairly punished and victimized by a school system that failed to comply with the law. They also condemned school officials for “treating us like chattel.”

“We are determined to make noise and fight back,” said Millet Panga, a leader of the Philippine Educators Network (PEN), an umbrella of Filipino teachers in PGCPS.

“We’re calling on the Filipino American community and labor unions to stand with us against this injustice,” she said.

The Department of Labor early this month banned PGCPS from hiring Filipino and other foreign teachers for two years or renewing the visas of teachers already at work because the school system “willfully violated H-1B visa rules” by asking the teachers to pay visa and other fees that should have been shouldered by the employer.

As a result, about 800 Filipino teachers could lose their jobs and be sent back to the Philippines.

The visas of about 250 of them are due to expire within the next few months and unless the problem is resolved they would be the first batch due out.

The county school district has been sponsoring work visas for hundreds of teachers from the Philippines in the last six years.

In addition to barring PGCPS from petitioning for new visas and visa renewals for foreign teachers, the US Department of Labor also ordered the county to pay the teachers $4.2 million in back pay.

At a meeting on Thursday organized by Philippine embassy labor attaché Luzviminda Padilla, community leaders, lawyers and teachers discussed options to fight back.

“This is a very urgent issue for our Filipino-American community and we should all rally behind our teachers and give them our full support,” said J.T. Mallonga, president of the Filipino American Legal Defense and Education Fund.

Mallonga said FALDEF was dedicated to providing pro bono legal aid to poor Filipinos and Filipino-Americans suffering legal injustices by reason of their immigrant origins and status.