Northshore Response

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

The welfare of children has to be a primary concern of a school district. Unfortunately, several years ago the Northshore School District was accused of failing to protect some female students from inappropriate touching by a male teacher. It is certainly a painful part of our history of which no one is proud.

In the Oct. 22 edition of the Seattle Times, you may have read a story about the events leading up to the dismissal of teacher Carl Leede six years ago. At that time, the story was covered by the local media. It was not a secret. The recent article focused on the court records that were sealed by mutual agreement with the parents of the students involved in the case. The Seattle Times currently has information that the district does not have because the records were sealed.

In 1999, we at the District Office first learned about the allegations of inappropriate touching. We took immediate action to protect the welfare of our students. The teacher was removed from the classroom while we launched a thorough investigation by an independent investigator.

The investigator found that a number of people had reported Mr. Leede's inappropriate behavior to supervisors. That information had not been properly documented nor shared with anyone at the District Office. In short, the system failed because our own procedures to protect children were not followed.

We took legal action to dismiss Mr. Leede, reported his unprofessional behavior to OSPI, reprimanded the supervisor for not following appropriate procedures, and reviewed district policies, procedures and staff training protocols. As a matter of practical concern, we negotiated a settlement agreement to keep him out of the classroom and to avoid lengthy and costly legal proceedings.

The Northshore School District had a system in place to identify and report inappropriate touching since 1995, fully two years before state law required this of districts. In addition, all employees received annual reminders about how to identify and report inappropriate touching, as well as written guidelines about safe interaction with students. However, the facts of this case vividly illustrated the need to strengthen our procedures to protect student safety.

Since then we have worked cooperatively with our employee associations to establish a centralized file in Human Resources to record problems that should be shared with supervisors as employees transfer between schools or departments. Every year we work with all supervisors on procedures to follow if they become aware of any allegations of unprofessional conduct.

While no one likes to revisit incidents reported in the article, it's a good reminder that the Northshore School District cannot condone any behavior that compromises the safety or welfare of our students. Anyone who is aware of allegations of unprofessional conduct should report those promptly to the supervisor and to the Human Resources Department. We will continue to provide annual training sessions and reminders about protecting students' safety. It is our responsibility, and we take it seriously.

Dr. Karen Forys

Superintendent