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Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Breaking News: Starr was told about 2011 touching incident when he was Stamford Superintendent

...Documents obtained by The Advocate show one of the things the assistant principals questioned three years ago was why Valentine did not report to state authorities a student's claim that a teacher touched her inappropriately.
According to the documents, a ninth-grader told Stamford High administrators in early May 2011 that a male teacher had touched her breast, and the assistant principals were concerned that Valentine did not call Stamford police or the state Department of Children and Families, as state law requires.
In late May 2011 the assistant principals asked to meet with Starr to discuss Valentine, according to a report written by a private investigator later hired by the Board of Education to look into their claims...

...The assistant principals said they had pens and notebooks, according to the report, and that Starr "directed them to close their notebooks and to participate in a 'let's just all talk it out' type of meeting." The assistant principals "also reported that when each of them read aloud from their statements of concern, Dr. Starr made remarks and questions like, 'Do you really want to put that in writing?' " the report states.
The meeting was part of Starr's internal investigation. Starr concluded that the assistant principals' claims were unwarranted, and in mid-June 2011 he transferred three of them to other schools in the district. At the end of June 2011, Starr left for Maryland...

Upset with the findings of his investigation, the four assistant principals hired an attorney to bring their claims about Valentine to the school district.
On July 22, 2011, the attorney, Victoria de Toledo, of Casper & de Toledo in Stamford, wrote a letter to then-interim Superintendent Winifred Hamilton, then-school board President Polly Rauh and the former human resources director. De Toledo wrote that Starr told the assistant principals that complaining about the principal was "a career killer."
 http://www.ctpost.com/local/article/Former-Stamford-superintendent-was-told-about-5918443.php#page-1

17 comments:

  1. So Connecticut and Maryland run neck and neck when it comes to internal school investigations.

    ReplyDelete
  2. 'lets just talk"
    my jaw is to the floor.
    Please someeone send in the emergency child abuse educators and do a one month training with every staff member in the state. shut down the school and don't let the kids back till the adults grow up.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Bypass all the mess; just call 911.

      Delete
  3. The Board of Ed members you just re-elected are Starr's bosses, with hiring and firing authority. This is on them.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Between this Connecticut news, the Epps case, the Pineda case, and the news that a convicted sex offender remains employed by MCPS after being caught spying on teenage girls as they changed in a locker room at Herbert Hoover Middle School, is our Board of Education going to keep him as superintendent when the vote comes in February?
    http://www.wjla.com/articles/2014/11/montgomery-count-substitute-teacher-charged-with-sexual-abuse-of-three-more-students-109228.html

    ReplyDelete
  5. MoCo is the wild, wild, west of dysfunctional entities.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Professionals are encouraged to report any "suspicious" behaviors. There will be a bill presented in Annapolis to penalize failure to report. In this case, even a Superintendent of a school district should face "the music" if there is intentional behavior to discourage reporting. Also, the individual teachers face liability issues if they adhere to a principal's errant advice.

    ReplyDelete
  7. "There will be a bill presented in Annapolis to penalize failure to report."
    And in twenty years from now, there is a slight chance that it might become law.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Will Most Progressive Jaime Raskin be sponsoring the bill? Give it 40 years.

      Delete
    2. I was been optimistic.

      Delete
  8. Replies
    1. Let's hope the BOE gets the message. If the BOE renews his contract, then the county executive should take control of the school district.

      Delete
  9. @Anonymous 11/28, 11:17pm, the BOE just got the message from the voters. Everything they are doing is fine. Re-election every time. Not one incumbent lost.

    ReplyDelete
  10. In the county of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.

    ReplyDelete
  11. The BOE members didn't vet Starr because the county residents don't care. This county has changed. People used to care about the public school system. Now we just hand over our taxes and get nothing in return. The more we pay, the less we get in return.

    I am happy to pay for a world class system that is competitive, makes our neighborhoods desirable places to live, and of course provides our children with a top notch education, but I only see the opposite happening. Parents who can afford it are sending their children to private schools. MCPS is being rundown by incompetent leaders lacking vision and knowledge. Time to clean house.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Many county resident asked for transparency in the hiring process but got stonewalled.

      Delete

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