LA Times Under Fire for Publishing Teacher Performance Ratings that Possibly Pushed to Teacher, Rigoberto Ruelas Jr., to Commit Suicide

The Los Angeles Times is under fire after a teacher's suicide, which the teachers union is attributing to the newspaper's publication of teacher performance ratings on its website in August. Rigoberto Ruelas Jr., 39, was a fifth-grade teacher at Miramonte Elementary School, whose body was found Sunday at the foot of a remote forest bridge. The United Teachers Los Angeles union is asking the newspaper to remove the ratings from its website, according to Fox News. It is premature for the union to take this position, since it's not clear what are the circumstances surrounding his death. At least that's what the police department is saying.

The body of 39-year-old Rigoberto Ruelas Jr., a fifth-grade teacher at Miramonte Elementary School, was found Sunday at the foot of a remote forest bridge. Investigators believe he jumped to his death, although the inquiry is continuing, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department spokesman Steve Whitmore said.

The motive for Ruelas taking his own life is far from clear. But union officials said he had been upset since the Times published his district ranking as a "less effective" teacher based on his students' standardized English and math test scores.

Ruelas scored "average" in getting his students up to acceptable levels in English, but "less effective" in math, and "less effective" overall. The school itself ranked as "least effective" in raising test scores, and only five of Miramonte's 35 teachers were ranked as average. Source

If he committed suicide because he was despondent over his name being among the teachers rated, then he could have redoubled his effort to correct his shaky record. There was clearly no need for him to commit suicide, unless this was caused by another problem in his life.