Who is Debra Mastriano? NYC principal 'who hates Asians' bans desserts for students she deems overweight
NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: A New York public school principal's questionable behavior has exasperated the parents and educators. Debra Mastriano, the principal of PS 166 on the Upper West Side has introduced several bizarre rules and regulations including banning children from eating sweets, handing out strange punishments, and making racist comments. The city District Superintendent Kamar Samuels received a letter from a group of parents where Mastriano was alleged to have a 'pattern of toxicity' and was 'unfit' to hold her position.
The letter which is obtained by The New York Post details a list of infuriating incidents involving Mastriano including that she allegedly confiscated food from children she thought were over obese made children walk in circles during recess, and said the school was "too Asian. I hate Asian people." "It was just so Grinch-like," a teacher told The Post. The principal was recently shown in a photo leaning over a student in the school cafeteria and confiscating a donut that his parents had packed for him to go with his lunch.
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According to The Post, this is not the first incident. School sources claimed that the principal has previously snatched away bags of cafeteria-provided bags of chips, kept one kindergartner from eating birthday cake brought from home because she considered him overweight and had endless instances of snatching candy and other treats from students' lunchboxes. The problem became so frequent this fall that somebody confronted Mastriano at an October staff meeting as she stopped a first-grader from eating a candy bar.
As per the meeting notes, she showed her stubbornness and insisted that it was just "one time," and that said she "want[ed] them to be healthy, want[ed] them to have a good day. It was one child, one time," according to The Post. Mastriano has also allegedly made the children eat their lunches standing up while making them walk in circles as punishment.
One parent said her 10-year-old son told her that when he accidentally urinated on a bathroom floor, the principal had a fit screaming at him in anger. "He goes, 'Mom I was so scared. I don't know what I did to make her so mad at me,'" the parent told The Post.
Mastriano also reportedly has a history of eyebrow-raising history of candidly racist views including saying all black and Hispanic students at the school live at the nearby New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) building nearby. "I wish someone would level [the NYCHA building]," the letter noted she said. "It only breeds dysfunction. Except when they rebuild it, it should have good role models in it too, so they can learn good behavior."
One mother of Puerto Rican descent said Mastriano yelled at her then-fourth-grader last year, "Who lives with you? Do you even have a father at home? Is your mother addicted to drugs?" She also allegedly has asked teachers to lower the grades of special-needs students. "It's her way of saying we don't want you here," a parent told The Post. Teachers claim that she is a nightmare to work with too. They allege she rips bulletin boards off of walls, banned pencils to prevent students from erasing mistakes, and even decrees the color of paper students can and can't use.
On December 1 a no- confidence vote was held in which 28 faculty members and 73 former and current parents voted against Mastriano. Although 18 staff were absent, nobody voted to support the principal, according to The Post. A mere 14 percent of teachers at PS 166 supported their principal according to a poll by the Department of Education while across the city the average approval rate is 85 percent.