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Teacher claims admin unresponsive to bullying

Awaiting investigation report

Tiffany Tuell

(Updated: Thursday, January 13, 2011, 5:13 PM)

Student bullying, an issue making national headlines, hit home Jan. 6 when Oakhurst Elementary School second-grade teacher Elaine Brown said she was put on administrative leave Nov. 29 after trying to put an end to multiple incidents of bullying by a 7-year-old student at the school.

The student, she said, engaged in verbal and physical abuse against classmates, including choking, kicking another student between the legs and threatening to bring a gun to school.

More than 100 Mountain Area residents gathered Jan. 6 at a special meeting of the Bass Lake Joint Union Elementary School District Board of Trustees. The meeting was held to review district anti-bullying and anti-harassment policies.

Brown said she was told by Glenn Reid, district superintendent, that she was put on paid administrative leave pending an investigation of whether she had said too much to parents about the alleged bully. Brown said Reid informed her that parents had been calling him, saying she'd mentioned the student by name.

To abide by district employee policy regarding confidentiality, Reid said he was unable to confirm the reasons for Brown's leave.

Brown, a teacher at Oak Creek Intermediate School before coming to Oakhurst Elementary this year, said issues with the alleged bully arose at the beginning of the school year.

"I was really concerned when the (alleged) bully was reported to have hit another child in another classroom and left a bruise on the other child's cheek," Brown said. "The victim did have a dime-size bruise on the cheek."

Brown said the student was not suspended for the incident.

She said the student in question also entered her classroom in a belligerent manner, so she sent him home. He was back in her classroom 20 minutes later, Brown said, with word from Oakhurst Principal Kathleen Murphy to notify her if further issues arose. Brown said this happened on more than one occasion.

When informed by another student that he had been choked by the alleged bully, Brown said she reported the information to Murphy. The student was not suspended, only a few recesses taken away, Brown said.

Brown said she told her students to tell her or the principal if bullying occurred. Then, she said, she began hearing reports of verbal and physical violence and threats, and documented all the reported incidents.

"I had no idea things were going on at this level," Brown said. "With this level of threats, I knew I had to go to the superintendent because, from past experience, I knew the principal wouldn't take this as seriously as it was."

Brown said she and her California Teachers Association union representative tried to meet with Reid but were unable to. Brown said she was told by Reid to follow the proper chain of command by first meeting with Murphy.

"I wanted to make sure the [(alleged]) bully wouldn't be placed in my classroom for the safety of the children and told [(Murphy]) if she could not assure me that [(the student]) would not be in my classroom, I'd have to take it to parents and law enforcement," Brown said.

Brown said she called the sheriff's department and later received a letter of reprimand from Murphy. She said she then called parents of victims so parents could get help for their children if needed.

Brown said she also informed the alleged bully's mother that she was putting the child on suspension. Brown said she gave documentation of the incidents to Murphy's secretary.

At a Nov. 29 meeting with Reid, Brown said, she was surprised to be met by the district's legal counsel. After 20 minutes of discussion, she said, she was handed a letter stating she was being put on administrative leave, pending an investigation.

Since then, Brown said, she has heard nothing from the district or an investigator. She said she decided to go public for three reasons: intimidation by administrators, a desire to stop what she has learned is not a new issue and concerns about students' and her own safety.

Brown said it's impossible for children to learn in an environment where they don't feel safe. She said she hopes the situation will give children a voice, help teachers realize they aren't alone and heighten public awareness of what can happen to teachers without support from their administrators.

The Jan. 6 meeting, with four Valley television stations present, began with district principals reviewing their bullying policies, followed by public commentary.

Parent Terry Nevins said his daughter and nephew have reported being victims of the alleged bully. He said the boy severely beat up his nephew previously and had again the same day as the meeting.

"They say they've taken care of the problem, but they haven't or else my nephew wouldn't have been beat up," Nevins said. "So whatever they're doing, it is not working. What the school board and the school needs to do is use resources at their disposal and get the child some help. I hope the board got the message that they have a serious problem and need to deal with it."

Nevins said something should have been done as soon as Brown provided documentation of the bullying.

"They need to immediately reinstate Ms. Brown because she is an asset to the school, and it's not her fault they didn't act on the bullying problem," he said. "She is the best teacher my daughter has had in her three years at the school."

Also at the meeting, Shelley Arnest spoke on behalf of Brown, who she said was her grandson's teacher.

"She was an absolutely wonderful person, and she interacted with kids really, really well," Arnest said. "She is very personable."

Arnest said her grandchildren have been bullied at the school by other students and that when she talked to administrators about it, nothing was done.

"No kind of administration entity is perfect, but they have some flaws that can be fixed, and it seems like they'd rather ignore them than fix it," she said. "Brown was the kind of person that would jump in and go to bat for her students. To lose Ms. Brown is a great injustice to the community and children as a whole."

Speaking on the condition of anonymity after the meeting, a parent of a child in Brown's class said Brown "interrogated" students about the boy without parents present.

"She disclosed confidential information, and that's not right," the woman said.

She said she thought Reid had done the right thing putting Brown on administrative leave until an investigation is complete. She also said the boy in question protected her child on more than one occasion from other bullies.

Ted Sampson, who was not given the opportunity to speak during the meeting, said afterward that bullying has been an issue since his granddaughter was in preschool and that the district hasn't properly addressed the issue. He said his granddaughter also has been a victim of many threats by the alleged bully.

"I know this individual is a troublesome kid, but I think the way the school has handled it is wrong," Sampson said. "It is a serious thing and should be treated as such, and I think the board danced around the issue and never really addressed it."

An open letter to the community, signed Monday by Oakhurst Elementary School's 14 teachers, said the teachers have at no time felt threatened to discuss behavior problems with administrators.

"We trust you to remember that there are always two sides to a story, and we ask that you seek the facts before making assumptions based on limited sources," the letter said. "Please help us move past the blame and negativity that is surrounding this unfortunate situation."