School officials hear preliminary report from safety advisory panel

By Lynn Hotaling

Superintendent Mack McCary established the panel in August after first-year Blue Ridge School teacher and athletic director Joe Brooks pleaded guilty to eight felony and three misdemeanor charges involving Blue Ridge students. He was dismissed from his duties at the school July 25.

Though events at Blue Ridge precipitated the formation of the panel, both McCary and panel leader Allen Painter said the intent was not to investigate a specific school but to make recommendations to improve safety in all schools.

"Our recommendations are not directed toward Blue Ridge in any way," Painter said.

McCary initially asked the panel to make recommendations with regard to 1) additional training and procedures needed to help all county school children; 2) the student "code of silence" and how school personnel can work with students to increase their trust in adults; and 3) working with parents to recognize possible child sexual abuse and the steps to prevent it.

Board member Ray Trine said the "code of silence" was troublesome to him. Kids in school fear speaking out because of repercussions, he said. That also appears to be true of teachers and administrators.

"There's got to be some process to regularly bring up hard issues," said panel member David Hutchinson of Smoky Mountain Center. "There needs to be staff training where things are talked about every year so we can break that barrier of silence."

School personnel have to be more aggressive about getting that message out, Hutchinson said.

"Every kid hears 'if this happens to you, here's what you do, here's who you talk to,'" Hutchinson said.

McCary said all such discussions were "taboo" only a few years ago. Established procedures must always be followed, he said, to ensure all reports are investigated and that they remain confidential until substantiated.

The panel's preliminary investigations included:

- A "School Safety Needs Assessment" with input from parents, teachers, staff and students.

- Comprehensive in-service training on sexual abuse and harassment for administrators, teachers and staff.

- Provide sexual abuse and harassment training to upper elementary and above grades at least once per year.

- Facilitate linkage of parents with training on sexual abuse and harassment issues and provide each family with an informational packet.

- Wider dissemination of existing school sexual abuse and harassment policy.

- Establish TEACH Hotline for non-anonymous reports.

- Establish objective versus subjective non-discretionary dress code and appropriate conversational (i.e. vulgar or suggestive language) guidelines.

- Conduct mandatory background checks for volunteer staff who have ongoing and direct contact with children.

- Increased availability of counselors and/or mental health professionals at high schools.

- Greater accountability of teacher "pull-outs" by teachers and/or staff.

In other business Monday night, Smokey Mountain Elementary School was featured in the monthly "Spotlight on Quality" segment. Language arts teacher Whitney Kirkland and her seventh-grade students demonstrated how they had researched and acted out myths and folk tales.

Also, art teacher Jennifer Dall and fourth-graders described an art project they had done using Total Quality Management guidelines. - The superintendent recognized the school system finance department - David Steinbicker, Earlene Keever, Myrtice Brooks, Melanie Bryson and Wanda Owen - on receiving a Gold Certificate from the N.C. Department of Public Instruction for 12 months of error-free payroll accounting. Also commended was Mary Slagle, SMES eighth-grade teacher, who received the National Geographic Literacy Award (a $2,500 grant) from the national Council of Social Studies.

Back to Archive: 11/29/01.