- If you drove past South Union Ave. on Monday, August 26, you may have heard chanting and honking.
- Staff and students with the Farmworkers Institute of Education and Leadership Development protest for their education.
- President and CEO of FIELD, David Villarino, leads the protest. He calls for the resignation of new leadership on the FIELD board.
- Ines DeLuna releases a statement in response to Villarino’s press release.
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
On Monday, students and faculty of the Farmworkers Institute of Education and Leadership Development (FIELD) held a demonstration outside their offices on South Union Ave.
Organizers calling for the resignation of board members, Dr. Mark Martinez and Dr. Nora Dominguez, along with consultant Jaime Quinones, over changes they claim have left teachers and students confused, and academic progress ground to a halt.
“Today, a good sample of students and staff are here to demand the resignation of field director Mark Martinez and director Nora Dominguez,” said David Villarino, the President and CEO of FIELD. He told 23ABC reporter Avery Elowitt that he took a sabbatical in April, followed by a paid administrative leave.
Since then, he said the new leadership has refused to consult teachers, students, and staff about any changes, and went on to call it a "power and money" grab.
Villarino said there has been a drastic change in schedules and that staff has to work a de-facto 12 hours.
“The biggest single change is rather than have one class, one teacher for the students in all subjects, they’ve changed it so that they have six classes here and each class is a separate subject, which means that the students will have to leave their employment to come to class,” said Villarino.
23ABC reached out to Ines DeLuna, chair of the FIELD board of directors, who released a statement in response to villarino’s press release.
DeLuna’s statement claims that work hours were adjusted to meet student’s interests, and that the recent schedule changes led to a reduction in hours.
It went on to state, “FIELD does not discuss specifics of any pending personal matters… Mr. David Villarino has been on a sabbatical leave since April 2024 and more recently was put on a paid administrative leave while field conducts an investigation that is presently ongoing."
FULL STATEMENTS:
Here is the full statement from David Villarino’s press release titled “Teachers and Students Call for resignations of FIELD Leadership due to Discriminatory Changes”:
Dr. Mark Martinez and Dr. Nora Dominguez, Farmworkers Institute of Education & Leadership Development (FIELD) Board members, and disgraced former KHSD administrator Jaime Quinones, ignoring student and staff complaints of discriminatory operational changes jeopardizing FIELD’s future and the education and training of working adult farmworkers and immigrants.
Bakersfield, CA – August 26, 2024 – Over the past 25 years, the Farmworker Institute of Education & Leadership Development (FIELD) has proudly served over 140,000 adult learners across its 22 campuses throughout rural communities of California.
Over the last four months, FIELD has abruptly and inexplicably made changes in leadership, operations, and services that have left students and teachers confused and upset that their academic progress is being stopped. The new leadership has refused to consult teachers, students and staff about the proposed changes. Notification took place days before the start of classes. With little knowledge and no program experience board members Mark Martinez (CSUB Professor), FIELD COO/Board member Nora Dominguez and EPIC consultant Jaime Quinones are meddling in operations while approving these unusual actions. This is all part of a power and money grab orchestrated by their Texas attorney, Joseph Casas for additional billing hours and a request for compensation by FIELD Chair Ines DeLuna, such request is unprecedented for a volunteer chair.
In April of 2024, President/CEO David Villarino took a paid sabbatical, and recently was placed on paid administrative leave for unsubstantiated reasons. The takeover group, led by Martinez, Dominguez, De Luna and Casas are using this as a pretext to immediately gut the rural workforce program. The takeover group, who ousted Villarino, have also changed the governing board members, violated state statutes, changed the curriculum and scheduling, made unilateral changes to the class locations forcing class closures in East Bakersfield, Paso Robles, Greenfield (Soledad), and a planned closure of Lamont. It also resulted in a de-facto 12 hour work day for teachers and staff, and the implementation of a traditional subject specific high school class schedule for teachers and adult students. Besides being material changes to the EPIC charter these changes will preclude the working farmworker and immigrant adults from attending class thereby allowing the new administrators to only serve credit-deficient high school dropout youth. Essentially, killing FIELD’s mission.
“These changes were made -planned in secret and introduced at the last minute - leaving us with more questions than answers," said one concerned teacher, who remained anonymous out of fear
of retaliation. "The negligence, incompetence, lack of communication, lack of collaboration and disdain for our students is wrong."
To confront the board, on August 2nd, over 100 teachers and students gathered at FIELD’s Union street center to address the directors at the board meeting. However, DeLuna, Dominguez and Martinez ordered the segregation of the students in a room apart from the board, a room with a 95 degree temperature, a room without chairs, water, air conditioning nor translations for the predominantly Spanish speaking students. The board even hired armed guards to intimidate and surround students during the meeting. This left the students feeling criminalized rather than empowered—a stark contrast to the legacy, Vision and Core Values of FIELD and EPIC’s founders, Cesar E. Chavez, and David Villarino.
"The board meeting left us with no resolution, no explanation, and no change," said a student representative. "Our voices have gone unheard, and we are now seeking support from the community and the media to help us shed light on what is really happening."
"We deserve to know why we are not being considered," continued the student representative. "FIELD should be able to operate as a personal empire of these administrators without regard to those it serves. FIELD’s mission is to empower us, not silence us."
At KHSD, the charges of creating a hostile work environment were upheld against Quinones. Now these same charges against Quinones have emerged at FIELD. However, DeLuna, Dominguez and FIELD’s Human Resources have ignored or refused to investigate these charges. This amounts to selective and discriminatory enforcement.
As such, staff, teachers and students are calling for the resignation of Dominguez, Martinez and Quinones. This will ensure FIELD operates with integrity and uphold its core values, which have been abandoned along with the commitment to serve farmworkers and recent immigrants in rural communities.
Teachers and students invite media representatives to join them in their demand for equity, access and inclusion. The community deserves to know about the dismantling of the most successful, historic and unprecedented educational and training program for farmworkers and recent immigrants in the state as envisioned by Cesar E. Chavez and organized by David Villarino.
WHO: Adult Students of FIELD’s EPIC de Cesar Chavez Charter School and Community
WHEN: Monday August 26, 2024 at 5:00 PM
WHERE: FIELD’s Operational facility, 2240 South Union Ave, Bakersfield, CA
WHAT: Picket line and Press Conference
WHY: Resignation of Nora Dominguez and Mark Martinez for negligence/ incompetence
Contact: David Villarino 661-972-8485 davidvillarino27@gmail.com
Adonis Galarza 442-234-8617 adonis.galarza97@gmail.com
Here is the full statement from Ines DeLuna’s press release titled “FARMWORKERS INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION & LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT (“FIELD”) BOARD REACTS TO UNDISCLOSED MAY 2022 CONCERNS”:
“In response to public misinformation, be informed that the Board of Directors the Farmworkers Institute of Education & Leadership Development (“FIELD”) has been working to respond to concerns reported to the organization on or about May 2022 about FIELD’s Escuela Popular Instituto Campesino (“EPIC”) its charter high school program. EPIC is free adult school for those looking to earn their high school diploma. Students are taught in a traditional school setting with instructors who understand both their cultural background and academic struggles. Although known to FIELD administrative leaders, these concerns were not brought to the Board’s attention until or about January 2024.
In response to some of the concerns, EPIC administrators and consultants worked to address a improve prior inefficiencies to allow teachers to better collaborate and communicate with each other and about the delivery of instruction to EPIC students. The prior existence of eleven (11) different instructional schedules needed to be adjusted to meet the demands of students.
In March 2024 EPIC administrators and consultants began to prepare surveys for students to seek information and background on meeting their instructional needs. Survey results indicated that 80% of students preferred to take classes during the morning hours of 8 a.m. to noon and in the evening hours from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Only 20% of students wanted classes between noon and 3 p.m. These results informed the decision to implement a split instructional schedule, where students will now receive instruction from 8:30 p.m. to 12 p.m., and then return to complete their day from 5:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.
To meet students’ interests, teachers work hours were adjusted accordingly. The split shift schedule allowed for a decrease in the number of teachers work days during the year, a reduction of their weekly hours from 40 hours to 35.75 hours, without any reduction in pay from their prior year’s earnings. With the new schedule, teachers work hours in a day do not exceed 7.5 hours on Mondays through Thursdays and 5.75 hours on Fridays.
Regarding the August 2, 2024 meeting, there were not 100 teachers and students in attendance at the Board Meeting. Due to a larger than expected audience, FIELD staff welcomed attendees into the multi-purpose room to accommodate the 30 to 40 attendees that could not fit in the Board meeting room. With this last minute adjustment, the air conditioning units were turned on but naturally it took time to cool the room. FIELD did have security present to monitor the parking area, no different from their regular services.
FIELD does not discuss specifics of any pending personnel matters. Mr. David Villarino has been on a sabbatical leave since April 2024 and more recently was put on a paid administrative leave while FIELD conducts an investigation that is presently on-going. While on leave, Mr. Villarino is not acting as an agent or in any official capacity for FIELD or EPIC.
For any questions concerning this matter, please contact Ines DeLuna, Chair of FIELD Board of Directors. She may be contacted by phone at (877) 877-1112 Email: ideluna@fieldinstitute.org
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