Tuesday, January 04, 2005

Administrative Buffoonery: Principal Apparently Caught With Hand In Cookie Jar

The Toledo Blade of Toledo, Ohio, is reporting that an elementary school principal is being fired for fiscal malfeasance.

Debra Weaver, Principal of Arlington Elementary School of South Toledo, is being canned due to, "Failing to follow board-approved procedures for the handling of funds and petty cash, misappropriating funds, and falsifying records."

Superintendent Eugene Sanders said that about $18,000 of school funds are missing and un-accounted for.

School investigators said that Weaver had, "Reimbursed herself for receipts already paid out of cash receipts." They also indicated that the principal failed to deposit money from student fund-raisers.

The school administrators union is (of course) fighting the dismissal. What I was surprised to learn is that administrators even have a union. Here in California, administrators can, technically, be re-assigned to the classroom by the superintendent (with board approval) at any time.

Did the lady take the money? I don't know for certain. But she did decline to give a statement to the paper. And one thing that I've learned over my years in the classroom is that neither an innocent child nor an innocent adult will suffer such an accusation in silence. They will scream their innocence from the rooftops. (Admittedly, the guilty will sometimes do that too, but the innocent always will.)

No criminal charges have been filed in the matter.

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