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School Employee & School Teacher
Background Checks:
Schools Can Do More to Prevent
and Detect Sexual Predators in Schools
"Schools typically perform the bare minimum,
one-time criminal history checks for teachers
and school employees mandated by state law. Red
flags in the employment history of new
applicants often go undiscovered, and crimes
committed by school staff during the term of
their employment can easily go undetected," says
Kenneth S. Trump, President of National School
Safety and Security Services, a Cleveland-based
national school safety consulting firm.
Trump says
schools needs to take several steps to better
protect students including:
Identify the limitations of current criminal
history checks (geographical areas covered,
limited to only a select category or categories
of school employees, etc.) and pursue criminal
history checks which cover the widest available
databases and requires checks of all employees.
Go beyond minimum
requirements of criminal history checks by
conducting more detailed background checks which
also look into employment history, past work
performance, educational credential
verification, and similar more detailed personal
histories.
Conduct periodic criminal history checks of
school employees during the course of their
employment.
Establish policies requiring school employees to
report any arrests for crimes to their school
district employer within 24 hours of such
arrests.
Providing training for staff and students, and
create a school culture where students and staff
are feel comfortable in reporting to school
officials and police known and suspected
inappropriate employee misconduct.
Establish a clearly identified process for
intake of complaints of employee misconduct and
create an investigation process which is fair,
objective, and thorough. Notify law
enforcement in a timely manner when allegations
involve alleged actions by an employee which
would constitute a crime.
Avoid "passing the trash" - a long-time
unwritten practice where school officials let
suspected problem employees resign in exchange
for no adverse records placed on the file and no
"bad references" when others inquire.
Trump says the vast
majority of educators and support staff are
professionals who are genuinely concerned about
the well-being of children and, who find sexual
predators and the taking advantage of children
to be appalling. Steps must still be taken, he
said, to root out those few persons who do harm
to children.
Questions may
be directed to Ken Trump. |
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