Posted on 12/17/2007 4:51:43 AM PST by yankeedame
YouNewsTV™Story
Published: Dec 14, 2007 at 6:13 PM PST
By Maria Medina
WAPATO -- Action News learned the first grade teacher at Camas Elementary on paid leave has got a criminal record that would concern any parent.
Earlier this week Action News told you the Wapato school district is staying tight-lipped about what happened, but sources close to the district told us the teacher was put on paid-leave after coming to class drunk.
Parents and residents are shocked the district hasn't yet fired the teacher, who's out of the classroom but still getting a paycheck.
Sources said it was this same teacher who came to school drunk a few months ago and may have struggled with a drinking problem for years.
A judge ordered the educator to stay away from alcohol after police found the teacher's child waiting in a car outside a bar.
There's also a charge of DUI, and the latest -- a hit and run and reckless endangerment charges from early this year.
The district refuses to go into detail, only confirming a teacher is on paid-leave and they're also dragging their feet in providing public records.
The superintendent asked for more time than the law provides to honor the request by Action News.
Our last resort was to drop-by the district's office on Friday, but again the superintendent was too busy to talk to us. Most times she's also too busy to return phone calls.
Concerned parents and residents have told Action News that they just want answers.
Witnesses reported seeing the teacher vomit on a field trip and then leave first-graders to wander through a corn maze by themselves while the teacher passed out on a school bus.
There's a clue that the district knew something was going on with the teacher because the former superintendent asked the state's superintendent office to investigate the teacher, but the state never did because the alleged behavior happened during summer break, it didn't affect students or the district.
The superintendent could give no date on when they'll decide whether the teacher could come back or when they might honor that public records request.
But did the teacher pay her NEA dues? That is the most important thing in US education.
Maybe this would have been shocking 20 or 30 years ago. Sadly, I'm not all that surprised.
I'm skeptical that a judge's order to stop drinking alcohol will be very effective.
The school board is just concerned that the teacher’s drinking problems will distract from the core mission of liberal indoctrination.
She's lucky that those weren't high school students.
They would have probably shaved off her eyebrows and posted it on youtube.
Man if ya fired all the teachers that are drunks you’d need to hire a whole passel of new teachers.
And if ya threw is those that are on illegal drugs man would ya need a bunch of new ones.
Course the N.E.A. would never allow say random testing of those you entrust your kids to.
In before "Children of the Corn" jokes."
BTW, shouldn't it be called a "maize maze"?
He had eight children and worked a second job part-time at sears in order to support his family. He was an amazing history teacher. Every test he gave asked for one thing. That was an essay asking to explain in detail, in your own words, absolutely everything assigned during the week. It took him three days of late nights every week just to read and grade the tests.
The teacher is headed for a teaching job somewhere where the state can’t monitor his/her every move. Homeschool.
They are there to cover her butt all the way and superintendents are NEA members, too.
Superintendents of school districts are always unable to talk when the teachers get caught doing bad things.
Unelected and unaccountable.
There out to be a law to make them speak and automatic fines for holding up documents the public is entitled to.
Ping!.......
BWA! My dad had a saying:
The day I can’t do my job drunk is the day I turn in my badge and gun!
Saddest thing is that if this teacher gets fired, this teacher will sue for unfair dismissal ... and win.
Let's reward the guy now. Paid leave makes me sick.
If he is found innocent, his pay can be returned or restored to him. You know they'll never make him pay back what he already has once he is convicted.
bump!
This shouldn’t be shocking for anyone near Wapato. It is on the Yakama Indian Reservation where most of the residents are drunk a lot of the time. You have to be careful not to hit a drunk person on one of the roads while driving at night. They often are straggling along if not passed out in the middle of the roads. This place is in the boonies.
Gee—sounds like a wonderful place to live/sarc
“Concerned parents and residents have told Action News that they just want answers.”
Guffaw. Answers. That’s it?
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