On Monday, we had our follow up meeting with the district about the Principal / PTO issue. PTO Executive President Cindy Dehne, DCSpost.com Representative Rob Talbot, Superintendent Wilkinson and School Board President Greg Cwayna were there. We wanted to look into the issue at hand, what policies were at play and what new policies might be needed. Some very interesting points came up.

First we were handed the "School Patron Complaint Procedure". We did not know one existed but we should not have been surprised. It is funny to have received it at the meeting on this topic since we never saw this during the "Laptop" or "Security" issues meetings. It makes one wonder what makes this situation different from the others?

It gets even better when the first line of the procedures states:

"In the event of a question or complaint by a school patron involving current and ongoing teaching issues with respect to such patron's student and any teacher employed by the District, the patron shall with in 10 days of the alleged problem or incident, first contact the teacher involved as a step toward resolving an actual or a potential problem."

All great stuff but it has nothing to do with the situation at hand. This was not about a situation between a student and teacher. This was about whether or not a school employee may have used their position to benefit a future family member. I reread the policy about five times and still cannot find any verbiage that addresses this situation. Why did we not get a copy of a policy dealing with the situation involved here? Could it be there isn't one or maybe there is something going on that we are not supposed to know?

Next we were told that the school is not going to look into anonymous accusations. They said since we were not there, we were not a credible source. Does this sound like the statements of individuals that want to help or hinder? You would think the district would be more interested in investigating the facts then they would be with the source. It only took us a few days to verify the facts surrounding this situation. It is not that hard to find out information if you really want to. They mentioned that our facts were not accurate. Notice that they did not offer up what parts of our investigation needed updating.

Then we were handed a sheet from the state guidelines for school districts, "Section 544: Certain Personnel Records May Be Kept Confidential". We don't know why the school continues to bring this up. WE KNOW THIS. We are not looking for personnel information.

As we were closing the meeting, the school district asked us to help them to get people to go directly to them with their concerns. We do encourage people to talk to the school first. It is hard to convince people to do this when it appears that the school district does little or nothing to address their concerns. This whole incident is a classic example. Superintendent Wilkinson's initial response was to say the facts were wrong and mention that the individual in question no longer works at the t-shirt company. That is when we had to explain that is was not this year's order that was in question. In regards to Superintendent Wilkinson, it makes us wonder:

• When questioned by Superintendent Wilkinson, did Principal Debbie Straughn fail to mention that this happen at a different time? Not exactly a lie but certainly could be a misrepresentation of the truth.
• Maybe the Superintendent was not looking for the truth?
• Maybe the Superintendent does not have the experience, training or knowledge on how to find the truth?

Then Superintendent Wilkinson said that everybody involved felt that things were fine and there was nothing done inappropriately (statement unsubstantiated). First that wasn't the issue at hand, the issue was whether a school employee may or may not have used their position to benefit a future family member. Second, sorry if we don't understand, but shouldn't the board be making that decision whether or not this was inappropriate behavior?

Interestingly enough, we were told they were not going to investigate anonymous allegations. Obviously they did investigate it; so, at what point was it determined that this was an anonymous allegation? It would almost appear that this determination gets made when it best suits the district. And they wonder why nobody will come to them directly.

We recommended that there be a policy where people could come to the school district with out fear of retribution. For lack of a better term a 'Whistle Blower' Policy. They said they would look into it. We will keep you updated as events warrant it.

August 18, 2006: A few of our facts were incorrect yesterday. We have corrected and updated them.

August 17, 2006

Parent Post

If a principal recommends a company to do some "work" to the PTO president without first disclosing the salesperson is a "friend" (engaged to her offspring) is that a conflict of interest? Only after a large order was placed, was that disclosure was made. Now it seems that several orders have been placed, and this same salesperson has been referred to other schools in district and it is rumored that over the summer the salesperson is now a FAMILY member. Please advise if you know if this is a direct conflict of interest. Thanks so much

Our Reply

It might be a conflict of interest, unethical or even illegal, but we don't know. It certainly doesn’t pass the sniff test. Here are the facts that we uncovered:The Deer Creek Elementary PTO was negotiating with a local company to buy about $6,500 worth of t-shirts for a fund raiser.

1. Initial appointment was to be with an internal salesperson.
2. The Deer Creek Elementary Principal, Debbie Straughn, got involved with the process.
3. Debbie Straughn said that the PTO needed to use an outside salesperson.
4. Debbie Straughn set up the next meeting with the outside salesperson. (not a PTO meeting).
5. The outside sales person was Debbie Straughn’s future daughter-in-law.
6. It is unclear at what point Debbie Straughn told people that the new salesperson was her future daughter-in-law.
7. At a later date, the PTO ordered additional apparel from the same salesperson.
8. The order was done incorrectly.
9. The PTO rejected the order.
10. Debbie Straughn became agitated with the PTO when they rejected the order.
11. Debbie Straughn pushed the PTO to accept the order, stating that the salesperson (her future daughter-in-law) might lose her job if the PTO did not accept the order.
12. Even so the PTO still rejected the order and placed a new order for the correct items.
    

Now technically, by school standards, Debbie Straughn hasn’t done anything wrong . The school district does not oversee purchases by outside clubs or organizations. On the other hand, if this purchase was made by the school district, Debbie Straughn would have violated numerous school purchasing policies. You can request a copy of the purchasing policies from the Superintendent's office, 405-348-6100. We are curious to see how the school district handles this situation now that it is out into the open.

Here are some peripheral issues that came up during our investigation:

Perception: People mentioned that they could see why the Principal thought this was okay when the Superintendent’s daughter’s employment was approved by the board when it appeared the job was never posted.
Note: It is still not clear whether that position needed to be officially posted.

Perception: The Superintendent and the Deer Creek Elementary Principal, Debbie Straughn, were close friends. Every time an issue was brought up about the Debbie Straughn, it was laughed off.
Note: We were not able to substantiate this perception.

Perception: Debbie Straughn will misrepresent the truth when challenged on an issue.

Perception: Debbie Straughn will take it out on a child when challenged by their parents.

If all of this isn’t bad enough, Debbie Straughn became irate this past school year when the PTO chose not to fund her request for a project but instead to fund different projects for the school. The rumor is that after that meeting, Debbie Straughn brought the PTO President into her office and loudly challenged the PTO’s decision. Those on the other side of the door could hear Debbie Straughn's raised voice. This suspect behavior is from an individual who once said that she could get into trouble by being so involved with the PTO’s business.

We want to end this article by thanking all of the volunteers that continue to donate their time to make our school district what it is. We are glad to see that people continue to help even when they go through situations like this.

We again ask -- Where will it all stop? Will the higher ups keep burying their heads in the sand? Or will they recognize that great test scores don’t excuse improper behavior? Where will the test scores go when the parents give up? On that last question, hopely we will never find out.

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