Column: State policies allowed Benton schools teacher to walk away

I was flipping through the State Department of Education's manual for school investigators this past week, trying to figure out how a teacher with a confirmed history of sexually inappropriate behavior with students could just walk away from a school - licensed to teach and not charged with any crime.

I was looking for loopholes that would allow a school district to quietly allow or encourage such an educator to resign without notifying legal or licensing authorities.

I guess I'd been imagining those resignation deals being cut in some dark alley or smoke-filled backroom. What I found wasn't nearly so dramatic: It's right there in the manual.

The DOE definition of teacher sexual abuse includes state criminal statutes but also inappropriate teacher conduct with students, such as sexual language, innuendo and behaviors with “suggestive sexual overtones” and sexual harassment.

When a teacher is accused of violating that legal or ethical code, a school-based investigator first decides if it should be investigated more thoroughly by someone outside the school.

If they feel a crime was likely committed, they forward the case to law enforcement. If they think it's an ethical violation, they send it to an external investigator. Unless, that is, the accused teacher should happen to resign.

The manual is clear: The school only has jurisdiction if the adult under suspicion is a current school employee. In other words: if the teacher goes away, the investigation goes away - whether the abuse is founded or not.

When that happens, the investigator can still choose to forward what they've got to the state licensing board, or they can just close the file and forget it.

That's a heck of an incentive for a teacher under investigation to resign, and a heck of a bargaining chip for a school district looking to preserve a public image.

And it makes the right choice the difficult choice for districts and teachers looking to put the ugly past behind them.

Take the Benton Community School District's explanation last week of why they didn't pursue action against Walter Drahozal's license immediately upon his resignation in 2006:

“At the time, the district did consider filing a complaint with the Board of Educational Examiners against the employee, however the employee had not engaged in any conduct that would have legally required the district to file a complaint.”

They weren't legally required to. That's the bottom line.

And that's what's got to change.