Blacklisted teacher reacts to Ozark School Board Town Hall meeting

By Major Danny Cazier, former JROTC instructor at Ozark High School

I’m not sure how best to characterize the Town Hall meeting October 25.  Or rather, perhaps I just didn’t pick up on enough good themes to share.  In general, the Board members gave answers that had an air of plausibility to them but which those who had attempted to get action and accountability from the Board knew were incomplete or false. 

In response to a question that referenced numerous teachers having reported abuse from the superintendent, Jeff Laney remarked that if any teachers were having such an experience, they should stand up and speak out. 

That was appalling to hear him say, given that

1) WE HAVE, and

2) those who haven’t won’t because they are intimidated. 

I then arose and asked the following question:

The Missouri chapter of the National Education Association has published a document calling for Missouri legislators to strengthen the Missouri Teacher Tenure Act (https://www.mnea.org/sites/default/files/publications/Legal_Advocacy/dueprocesstenure.pdf), given that it offers only procedural protection but not substantive protection. In other words, they note that this act offers no protection for a teacher who is falsely accused. There is no opportunity to challenge a dismissal on the basis of the substance of the allegations against a teacher. 

The Missouri Teacher Tenure Act only offers protection for a teacher if the district violates the prescribed procedure for firing him/her (in terms of timeliness, notifications, etc.).  Given this, do you believe it is possible that an administrator could – EVEN IF YOU THINK THEY WOULD NOT – fabricate allegations against a teacher to drive him/her from the District?

Jeff Laney’s response included his insisting that there were multiple levels of protection (beyond the school district even) for a targeted teacher up to and including a lawsuit.  So after the meeting, I sought him out for conversation and asked him to name even a single level of recourse beyond the school board but short of a lawsuit. 

He refused to do so.

That because his response to every single question I asked him. 

If the question was specific, he responded that he would not talk to me about my case.  If the question was general and hypothetical, he responded that it was really just a question about my case and thus refused to respond to it. 

The only concession I got out of him was that

1) the Missouri State Teacher’s Association’s attorney’s response to my situation – to wit, that in a conflict between the school and the Army, I sided with the school and therefore should not be surprised at the school’s dismissing me – was irresponsible, and

2) that while under investigation, I was entitled to know what policy governed the investigation (but when I asked, I was denied).  The rest of my conversation with him consisted of his reiterating each time that he would not talk to me about my case. 

When I asked him to explain WHY he wouldn’t talk to me about my case, he directed me to ask my attorney why he wouldn’t talk to me about my case. 

It was quite frustrating to see his absolute indifference.

Shane Nelson noted at one point that not a single teacher had raised any complaints to his awareness about the school district’s superintendent. 

I confronted Nelson after trying unsuccessfully to talk to Jeff Laney.

 He acknowledged that he was aware of both Tom Swift’s and my complaints.  He apologized for having misspoken during the Town Hall, indicating that he meant to say that no teachers who weren’t ALREADY under investigation had complained about the superintendent.  He implied that those under investigation were simply accusing the superintendent in a bid to distract attention from their own misconduct. 

I pointed out to him that no one not under investigation was complaining about the superintendent because they were not being targeted.  That is a bit like saying no one who hasn’t been in a car accident has accused the other driver of having run into them. 

People’s first awareness that the superintendent is targeting them IS the suspension and investigation.  He seemed to recognize the point, kind of, but still seemed to think that you would only be accused if you were already guilty.

During the Town Hall, board members reaffirmed their supreme confidence in the superintendent. 

At least Jeff Laney and possibly also Shane Nelson insisted that he wouldn’t just be driving teachers out willy nilly.  Teachers are too valuable an asset for him to be driving them out if they didn’t really need to go.  He pointed out that a Professional Improvement Plan is the district’s effort to keep teachers from having to leave. 

Interestingly, when I asked Jeff Laney to tell me after the meeting how much time a teacher should have to improve, how much time between a Professional Improvement Plan and a Notice of Deficiency, he absolutely refused to do so. 

I experienced 9 work days between my PIP and my NOD (given that 9 days after my PIP I was suspended until my NOD).  I asked if that should have been adequate time to meet the expectations stated in my PIP. 

Naturally, he refused to answer. 

That wouldn’t really matter however, since my PIP is a farce, with no real plan of action, milestones, behavior objectives, etc.  It just says, you did something we didn’t like, so you’re in trouble.

Looking back, my post-meeting dialogue with Shane Nelson was a bit more productive. 

He was quite willing to talk to me about my case.  He just always seemed to believe there must be more to the story.  In the end, he at least agreed to take to the board my suggestion that any complaint against a member of the district-level administration would need to be investigated by someone independent (i.e., outside the district). 

While he recognized the merit of this suggestion, he also readily acknowledged that the board was very unlikely to adopt this practice.  He also agreed to take to the board my request for a hearing.  He insisted that the school’s attorney explained to them that my resignation obviated the need for a hearing.

  I pointed out that the language of the law offered no such exemption from a hearing. 

He asked me if I was suggesting that they just ignore their attorney’s counsel.  I told him they needed to meet her counsel with their own logical analysis and good judgment. 

I told him that even if the board feels they aren’t legally obligated to grant me a hearing, I still wanted one and was requesting they afford me one anyway.  He agreed to take that request to the board. 

My general take on Shane Nelson is that there is some level of desire to be better, to do better than the board has done in the past.  But that doesn’t go NEARLY far enough. 

He still isn’t able to see at all that one targeted by the superintendent has absolutely NO protection if the board ignores them, as the board continues to insist it is required to do.

FURTHER OBSERVATIONS

The attorney’s role is to serve the district’s purposes by finding a way for the district to legally do whatever it is that the district wants to do.  In the case of firing a teacher, then, the attorney explains what they need to do to avoid triggering any of the existing laws.  Since, as the school board so regularly points out, the superintendent runs the district, then the attorney serves the superintendent.  The board has repeated numerous times (including Sarah Orr’s saying this at the Town Hall) that they only supervise the superintendent. 

He runs the rest of the district. 

As this is true, should it be any surprise to the board that their attorney’s counsel to them is EXACTLY what the superintendent wants the attorney to tell them?

The attorney tells them that the law doesn’t entitle me to a hearing.  They accept that despite what the law clearly says. 

(For what it’s worth, Jeff Laney insists that what the law says doesn’t really matter because how judges have interpreted it and applied it is the real standard of a law’s meaning.  I understand his point, but it would be absurd to suggest that what is plan in black-and-white is irrelevant unless one has read all relevant subsequent case law on the matter.)

When the attorney tells the board that they can’t listen to a teacher’s allegations against the superintendent because they might eventually have to hear the teacher’s case and would then have to recuse themselves for having already developed opinions on the case, the school board accepts that explanation as true despite its being so easily refutable.

In short, the school board members regurgitate whatever claims the superintendent tells them. 

They regurgitate whatever the attorney tells them, without considering how the attorney’s role with respect to the school district makes the attorney’s advice a matter of “what you can get away with and the superintendent wants to do” rather than what is just and fair.

It is an echo chamber of the worst kind. 

It is an echo chamber of the worst kind. 

Maj. Danny cazier, ON Ozark R-VI leadership COMMUNICATION

The attorney’s role is to find every possible way to facilitate the superintendent’s agenda, no matter how wrong and illegal it might be. 

And since she (https://tuethkeeney.com/attorney/celynda-l-brasher/) works for a large and experienced legal team that specializes in education law, she is quite good at helping the district avoid repercussions for their retaliation, harassment, abuse, bullying, targeting, etc. of anyone who crosses the superintendent.

On a separate note, to explain why I am so convinced that the board members’ claim that they must refuse to consider any exculpatory evidence submitted them by a teacher, I offer the following:

1. There is NO ONE else who can provide recourse to a district employee who is being targeted by a senior administrator.
2. District policy requires that the superintendent update the board at every meeting on the status of any employees who have been suspended for more than 30 days.  So they are already hearing negatively biasing information.  They can’t insist that negative information is the only kind they are permitted to hear.
3. If they listened to a targeted employee and found themselves sympathetic to his/her case, then perhaps they would thereafter be a biased jury at a subsequent hearing.  But this is not a legal hearing.  It is an administrative hearing.  And so they don’t have the same requirement for impartiality.  And if this undermined the integrity of the proceeding, it would only do so IN FAVOR of the targeted teacher.  So no one is going to file a civil case thereafter based on the school board’s having been biased in favor of the teacher.  Only the administration could do that.  But they couldn’t, given the school board’s bias.
4. When the board told me they would never speak to me about my case, they claimed they had already read all the information I had submitted them.  This directly contradicts their claim that they weren’t permitted to.

I am certain I have thought of other evidence against this claim before, but this is all that comes to mind at present.

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