Tag: case law

Launching PA Educator Ethics Training

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Implementing the NEW PDE Chapter 49 “PE” Competencies – “The WHO, WHAT, WHY, & HOW!”

Blogger’s Note: We will return to Part II of “Bookends” next month to explore:

  • Stage 3: Inservice/Growing Years
  • Stage 4: Veteran/Sustaining Years
  • Stage 5: Next Chapter/Living the Dream

Instead, our November blog will share methods, modes, media, and other materials to provide meaningful professional development on ETHICS for EDUCATORS in the Commonwealth, resources from my upcoming presentation to school administrators at the Pennsylvania Department of Education’s SAS Institute – Successful Leadership – Shaping Your School’s Story to be held in the Hershey Lodge and Convention Center on December 11-13, 2023. Click below for my handouts.

planning-pd-for-ethics-sas-institute-handouts-s121123Download

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Interested in joining us at the Hershey Lodge on December 11-13, 2023? Please click here for more information or to register.

A Summary of My SAS Institute Ethics Session

To paraphrase the wisdom of one of my favorite recent visionaries and online workshop presenters, Simon Sinek, “Every organization should begin with “the WHY!” According to SmartInsights, Sinek’s Golden Circle theory explains “how leaders can inspire cooperation, trust and change in a business based on his research into how the most successful organizations think, act and communicate if they start with why.” On his website, he declares his own WHY: “We are here to inspire people to do the things that inspire them so that, together, each of us can change our world for the better.” I love his mission!

https://www.smartinsights.com/digital-marketing-strategy/online-value-proposition/start-with-why-creating-a-value-proposition-with-the-golden-circle-model/

“Your WHY is your purpose, cause, or belief. WHY does your company exist? WHY do you get out of bed every morning? And WHY should anyone care about the work you do?” – Simon Sinek

So… lets ask the questions that define our own golden circle, my session, and this article:

  • WHY should we be so concerned about professional development in ethics for PA educators?
    (Why should you even be reading this blogpost?)
  • HOW should we train our staff?
  • WHAT should be introduced and reinforced over the long term?

And, I will add one additional question: WHO is responsible for all of this?

Well, the quick response to that last query is EVERYONE in the profession. However, this blog is particularly geared to school system leaders, career and technical center directors, and administrators charged with the responsibility of continuing education/professional development and induction programs for their PA educators.

The “WHY!”

Quick. Calling on all PA teachers! Without looking on the Internet, can you identify the exact title of your “code of conduct” (1)? Do you know the PA agency responsible for writing this code and adjudicating its rules (2)? Can you name the “code of ethics” recently adopted by PDE and the Board of Education which provides school staff comprehensive guidance in professional decision-making based on context (3)?

Hints? How about a few acronyms?

  1. CPPC
  2. PSPC
  3. MCEE?

Don’t you think “we” should at least be familiar with the commission that grants us the license to teach in PA as well as the document that “governs” our behavior, violations of which could remove us from our job or revoke our certificate?

Of course, six years ago, even I didn’t know we had a PA “code of conduct!” (I started teaching in the public schools in 1978 and it wasn’t written until 1992!) After retiring from full-time teaching in 2013, I was asked to present my first ethics workshop back in 2017 for a Pennsylvania Music Educators Association (PMEA) Regional In-Service Program. Already scheduling me for two other sessions, the organizer came to me, “Could you add a presentation on educator ethics?” My first reaction was, WHY? Why would this be necessary? I promised him I would do a little research before getting back to him… and found these (now updated) statistics. Here’s the WHY in a nutshell!

HORRIBLE! These are the number of PA educators by year who had misconduct complaints filed against them. Sure, a majority of their cases were not always fully prosecuted nor did they all result in a “guilty” verdict or plea, as this glimpse of educator disciplinary resolutions for 2016 (out of 672) for comparison shows (statistics from PDE):

But, if you can read the above graphic, that means that in 2016, 156 educators surrendered their license or had their certificate suspended or revoked! Obviously, no matter how you interpret the stats, this is a SERIOUS PROBLEM! And it may be due to a lack of training or understanding of the regulations and principles of ethical decision-making!

Why is this topic crucial for all pre-service, “rookie,” AND experienced professional educators? It is essential… not so much to serve as a reminder of the penalties for ethical infractions or spotlighting the occurrences you read or hear about in the news… but, because ETHICS are what we all stand for, the values we exhibit in our day-to-day decision-making, the integrity of the profession, and our “making a difference” in the lives of the students.

Ignorance of the law is no excuse for breaking it.

(Oliver Wendell Holmes)

The “WHAT!”

My colleague Thomas W. Bailey, a retired social studies teacher who reinstated his law license, and I set ourselves the goal of creating continuing education courses to provide REAL ethics training for PA educators. Thomas applied to the Pennsylvania Department of Education and received approval for a four-hour online Act 48 continuing education course for all PA educators (earning credits in PERMS) and a 25-hour online Act 45 PIL continuing education course for school system leaders, career and technical center directors, and other administrators responsible for planning the professional development of their school staff. The dates for our next two series of classes with open for enrollment in January 2024 are:

To register for either course, please go to Tom’s website: https://www.twbaileylaw.com/event.

Both of our courses satisfy the recently revised PDE Chapter 49 requirements of learning the “professional ethics” program framework guidelines:

For school system leaders and other administrators, PDE has set high expectations with the release of the following DEADLINES in April 2022:

“Chapter 49 requires instruction in professional ethics to be integrated in educator preparation, induction, and continuing professional development programs as follows.

  • Continuing professional development programs must integrate the professional ethics competencies no later than the 2023-24 academic year.
  • Educator preparation and induction programs must integrate the professional ethics competencies no later than the 2024-25 academic year.“

Our Act 45 and Act 48 courses cover the following subjects, definitions, and applications of these terms:

  • Fiduciary
  • Ethical Equilibrium
  • Personal Morality
  • Regulations of Law
  • Professional Ethics
  • Professional Dispositions
  • Moral Professionalism
  • Differences Between Moral and Ethical Standards (with Examples)
  • Codes of Conduct (Examples)
  • Codes of Ethics (Examples)
  • Differences Between a Code of Conduct and a Code of Ethics
  • PA Professional Standards and Practices Commission
  • Paths of Educator Discipline in PA (Local and State)
  • Loudermill Hearings
  • State Discipline System (from Misconduct Complaint to Appeals)
  • PA Code of Professional Practice and Conduct
  • The Educator Discipline Act
  • National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification
  • Model Code of Ethics for Educators

The “How!”

I know this will sound a lot like bragging, but what makes the Thomas Bailey + Paul Fox ethics courses truly effective and different from everyone else in the game (albeit there are few “classes on the codes” sponsored in our geographic area) is the process – a focus on top-down training (administrator to teacher to student), interactive discussion, and a major emphasis on borrowing from the research of “Principled Teaching” in Domains 4a, 4d, 4e, and 4f of the Charlotte Danielson Framework for Teaching, the Teacher Education And Mentoring (TEAM) Module 5 Guide of the Connecticut State Department of Education, and the Facilitators Guide of the Iowa Board of Educational Examiners.

In my SAS presentation, I review several different modes of case study analysis, from simple to comprehensive, modeling small group interactive peer review, encouraging healthy discussions of diverse opinions in an “open,” non-threatening environment. The following approaches could be adapted to your setting of in-service programs or inductions:

MOCK JURY

Degree of Misconduct, scenarios for learning the PA Code of Professional Practice and Conduct (CPPC): For more details, revisit the application of my misconduct rubric and explanation in the blog “Ethical Scenarios” here.

In collegiate sessions, I have used color-coded popsicle sticks and handouts of different hypothetical case studies for “the jury” to evaluate the behavior and “find the relevant code” in the CPPC.

VOICES IN MY HEAD

Random Bad Attitudes for review of the standards in the Model Code of Ethics for Educators: I doubt (or sincerely hope) you would not hear too many of these directly from the school staff, but comments like, “Don’t ask for permission, beg for forgiveness” are NOT ethical precepts! Let’s dissect these bad boys!

SEARCH FOR THE STANDARDS

Hybrid Approach for using “the negative voices” and researching appropriate provisions in both the CPPC and MCEE: Select a single bad attitude and break off into two or three teams, each focused on corroborating related ethical principles in CPPC, MCEE, and even the PA Educator Discipline Act (EDA).

ALL CODES

“Deep Dive” Case Study Analyses in small group break outs for comprehensive interactive discussions using an adaptation of the questions in the Connecticut State Department of Education TEAM Manual:

  1. What possible issues/concerns might this scenario raise?
  2. How could this situation conflict with school policy, CPPC, EDA, MCEE, or case law?
  3. In this situation, what are some potential negative consequences for the educator’s students, fellow educators, and the school community-at-large?
  4. What responses/actions will result in a more positive outcome and/or what proactive measures might be considered?

A single hypothetical scenario would first be presented to the full group, and then the educators would break off into 4-6 smaller groups to review these questions. Individuals may or may not all agree. A group leader is usually appointed to record their responses and then upon reconvening, report back to “the whole.” Here is a sample case study (painful reading; fictitious but based on actual past incidents):

The moderator may promote further discussion (sample answers below) and even pose additional questions like the following:

  1. What if the relationship was always of mutual consent?
  2. What if the teacher never taught the student while she was enrolled in his school?
  3. What if the relationship did not start until after the student graduated?
  4. What if his student was over the age of 18 during the time of the relationship?

It deserves mention here that this final training mode, representing perhaps the highest degree of scaffolding of the learning for the ethics training of your staff, proposes the establishment of a permanent school district Professional Learning Community (PLC) or ethics committee. We know from our past experiences in providing continuing professional development of educators that promote free, open, healthy sharing of potential professional decision-making conflicts or ethical “conundrums” – “what would you do” scenarios – will foster lasting long-term benefits. Danielson Framework for Teaching (Domain 4) and CSDE reinforce this philosophy of peer collaboration.

“Teachers must engage in district-facilitated conversations that focus on ethical and professional dilemmas and their professional responsibility to students, the larger school/district educational community, and to families.”

Connecticut State Department of Education

My educator ethics mentor and “hero” Troy Hutchings, Senior Policy Advisor to the National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification, admitted that in his early years of teaching, he felt a little reticent about going to his principal for advice in handling a situation of a student developing a “romantic crush” on him. To paraphrase his remarks during his webinar, “I was concerned that my supervisor might think I was encouraging the girl… Who could I turn to?” Sharing these anecdotes and talking informally with other faculty members will go far in building teamwork, mentor-mentee relationships, and intra-building trust in allowing more peer review towards enhanced educator decision-making.

If you need a resource on PLCs, my colleague (PA Principal of the Year to be honored at the upcoming 2023 SAS Institute) Dr. Tim Wagner recommended the handbook Learning by Doing by Richard DuFour, Rebecca DuFour, Robert Eaker, Thomas W. Many, and Mike Mattos (Solution Tree Press, 2016).

The authors’ summary of reasons to implement a PLC in your school building(s) are to:

  1. Improve staff’s individual and collective practice
  2. Build on staff’s “shared knowledge and experiences”
  3. Build clarity and understanding in the use of a common vocabulary
  4. Develop a library of accessible tools, templates, and protocols (i.e., ethical scenarios)
  5. Promote non-threatening, thought-provoking discussion on ethical decision-making

Wrapping It Up with More Resources

Every school setting is different, and your application of these staff ethics training ideas will be unique. Hopefully I have given any interested PA school system leader, CTC director, professional development or building administrator, or department chair some “food for thought.” For example, if you wanted to set up a PLC to meet regularly to discuss ethical issues, many of you may need to involve your teacher’s professional association and/or review their contract… or perhaps on-your-own implement a rotation of educators to experience these case study discussions during pre-scheduled inservice or induction days.

For “the keys to the car” to build your own local ethics professional development programs, we encourage you to sign-up for one of our classes here. For our PIL series, Thomas Bailey shares the native files of his PowerPoint presentations so that they can be turned around and taught to other educators, and then even students who are studying their own discipline code or online anti-bullying school policies. Here is an image of our PIL brochure which will be offered beginning on January 3, 2024.

I also suggest perusing Thomas Bailey’s free videos on this topic, slide #61 (page 31) from the handouts to my SAS Institute presentation (above), and these links to other blogs on paulfox.blog.

NOW YOU HAVE IT… the entire toolkit and rationale… the “who, what, how, and why” of educator ethics training and satisfying the new PDE Chapter 49 “PE” competencies.

© 2023 Paul K. Fox

Studies in PA Educator Ethics Case Law

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Photo by Associated Press: Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court

Reviews of Court Cases on PA Education Regulations & School Staff Misconducts

Special thanks to guest blogger Thomas W. Bailey, current attorney-at-law and retired social studies teacher, who provides Act 48 courses of continuing education in professional decision-making, analyzing educator ethics, the law, PA Code of Professional Practices and Conduct, and discussion and interpretation of sample fact scenarios based upon classroom dilemmas.

Previously, this blog site (category = ethics) has offered numerous articles on defining issues of morality, ethics, regulations, professional aspirations, codes of conduct and codes of ethics, teacher-student relationships and boundaries, confidentiality, mandatory reporting, and reviews by “mock juries” of educator misconduct case studies. For my PMEA music education colleagues, PCMEA members, and education majors and newcomers to the profession throughout the Commonwealth, one area that still needs to be addressed is a discussion on Pennsylvania case law. One essential question is applicable to ALL pre- and in-service educators across the country: Have you informed yourself about the structure of YOUR state’s three branches of government, laws governing school staff responsibilities, prohibitions, and discipline, specific codes of conduct and/or ethics, and the judicial review process and case law?

“Ignorantia juris non excusat.” (Ignorance of the law excuses not.)

Manitoba Law Journal, October 1885

Thomas Bailey has provided an outstanding resource for learning more about PA regulations, court decisions, and putting into practice the values of ethical decision making. Below is a glimpse of his court case blog. Please visit his website for more detailed information and to sign-up for online classes: https://twbaileylaw.com/.

PA Commonwealth Court Case – Music Teacher Charged with Immorality

M.T. v. PA Department of Education: Analysis written by Thomas W. Bailey

Background

A male high school instrumental instructor and band director, M.T., began a romantic relationship with a 10th grade female band student (Student) in 2001 while employed for a Pennsylvania school district (District). M.T. continued the relationship with the Student to include sexual acts during her junior and senior years. The Student testified several sexual acts occurred within the District’s band room and band room office ending in 2004 with her graduation. M.T. continued to contact the Student when she attended college.  Her parents complained to the District of continual communication by M.T. while their daughter was in college.  In July, 2004 the District gave a written reprimand to M.T. to cease contact with the Student.  M.T. continued contacting the Student after the reprimand.

The Student subsequently broke off the relationship with M.T. in the Spring, 2005 and told her parents of their sexual relationship. The parents then contacted the District where M.T. was still employed.

In April, 2005, M.T. was suspended without pay by District based upon the parent complaint. 

PSPC website

On November 7, 2007, the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) filed a Notice of Charges with the Professional Standards & Practices Commission (Commission) and served a copy to M.T. Charges from the Educator Discipline Act (EDA) included immorality, negligence, intemperance, cruelty, incompetence, sexual abuse or exploitation, and violations of the Code of Professional Practice and Conduct for Educators (Code of Practices). The violations of the Code of Practices included provisions prohibiting the acceptance of gifts by teachers and prohibiting sexual conduct between a teacher and student. PDE also claimed that M.T. posed an immediate threat to the health, safety, and welfare of students and sought immediate suspension of his certificates.

The Commission appointed a Hearing Officer (HO) who heard three days of testimony from the Student, M.T. and others. M.T. was represented by counsel.

The HO’s recommendation to the Commission include his Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law which determined PDE had met its burden of proof on all but two charges. The Hearing Officer’s recommendation did not find M.T. to have given a prohibited gift to Student and that he was not an immediate threat to students. M.T. filed many exceptions with the Commission. M.T. claimed the technical rules of admissibility of evidence apply during Commission hearings, that his alleged, immoral conduct was not testified to by third party witnesses and that PDE did not offer sufficient evidence of professional incompetence, among other exceptions. PDE asserted M.T. remained an imminent threat to students. 

Upon review, the Commission denied M.T.’s exceptions, found him to be responsible on all charges except the gift and immediately revoked his teaching certificates.

Issues Before the Commonwealth Court

  1. Do the technical rules of courtroom evidence apply during an EDA hearing?
  2. What educator conduct constitutes immorality in a relationship with a student?
  3. What educator conduct constitutes lack of professional competence for an educator engaged in a sexual relationship with a student?
The Commonwealth Court of PA was established in 1968 and is one of two statewide intermediate appellate courts.

Commonwealth Court’S Opinion

Technical rules of evidence followed in courtroom litigation do not apply to a Commission Hearing Officer. The strict rules of evidence practiced in Pennsylvania Common Pleas Courts and US District Courts are not followed. All relevant evidence of reasonably probative value may be received.

Sexual intercourse with a student inside the band room office constituted educator immorality. “Immorality is conduct which offends the morals of the Commonwealth and is a bad example to the youth whose ideals a professional educator or charter school staff member has a duty to foster and elevate.” Third party testimony to the immoral acts was not necessary. Immorality with a student violated EDA Section 9c(1).

M.T.’s professional competence in teaching kids did not appear to suffer during the sexual relationship with the student. Incompetency is a continuing or persistent mental or intellectual inability or incapacity to perform the services expected of a professional educator or a charter school staff member. Absence evidence of failure to prepare for class or uphold assigned duties, the educator was not proven by the preponderance of evidence presented to be incompetent in his actions. PDE failed to carry its burden to prove this Charge.

Importance

Immorality of educator student sexual relationship defined in detail. Criteria for professional incompetence explained as well as PDE’s burden of proof before the Commission.  PDE must prove elements by preponderance of the evidence: over 50% of the evidence produced exhibits culpability. 2-25-21

M.T. v. PA Department of Education 56 A3d 1 (Pa. Commonwealth Court 2010)

M.T. pro se

Attorney Nicole Werner for Pennsylvania Department of Education

https://twbaileylaw.com/blog/court-cases-4

Additional Court Case Summaries on the Thomas Bailey Blog Site

It behooves us to learn more about Pennsylvania case law. Read and share these additional analyses They will enlighten you and may foster additional discussion with colleagues. Feel free to post your own comments on Thomas Bailey’s website.

The final court judgment (Horosko v. Mt. Pleasant Township SD above) is one of the oldest, dating back to 1939, and may be considered the foundation and precedent for current PA school employee regulations and discipline, especially in the confirmation of the following quote from the PA Professional Standards and Practices Commission of the Pennsylvania Department of Education:

“Professional expectations do not always distinguish between teachers’ on or off-duty conduct. Accordingly, teachers must act in their private lives in a way that does not undermine their efficacy in the classroom, demean their employing school entity, or damage their position as a moral exemplars in the community.”

Unit 1, The Ethics of Teaching (Ethics Tool Kit)

What you say or do, both inside and outside the classroom, can and will affect your teaching effectiveness, professional reputation, and school employment status! But, if it is ever needed, be sure to know and exercise your rights, obtain the advice of a competent attorney, and avail yourself of due process.

PKF

© 2021 Paul K. Fox