Updated October 19: The Albemarle County Board of Supervisors called its colleagues on the county school board to task at a special October 15 meeting, asking Virginia’s Department of Education to scrutinize Albemarle’s troubled school district.
Supervisors unanimously approved a resolution that “responds to community concerns about alleged failures to comply with mandated child abuse reporting requirements and questions about compliance with transparency laws,” the board said in an October 16 statement.
Supervisors can’t legally compel the school board or the district to take action. But their resolution requests regular updates from the school board on how the district responds when staff suspect that someone is abusing a child. It also asks the board for updates about the independent investigation the school board approved in early August, so the public can weigh in on that inquiry’s scope and thoroughness.
County police said earlier this week that at least one school district employee reported feeling reluctant to report suspected abuse for fear of official retaliation. In response, supervisors asked the school board to set up formal protections for whistleblowers, echoing a request Supervisor Sally Duncan independently made in late September.
Supervisors further asked the school board to review how well it follows laws governing Freedom of Information Act requests, and to set up a formal crisis management plan with a clear timeline for what steps the district will take, and when, to address its problems.
The resolution concludes by sending up a signal flare to the state Department of Education, formally asking it to investigate and monitor the school district’s practices. On October 13, Gov. Abigail Spanberger condemned any “culture of fear and retaliation” in the district that might have kept employees from speaking up, and called for the prosecution of any staff members who failed in their responsibilities.
At the October 15 meeting, Supervisor Mike Pruitt said that since the supervisors’ previous gathering, “I have learned of even more patterns and practices [within the school district] that I consider just as or even more outrageous and repugnant, and indicate a deep level of dysfunction.”
“These students feel broken and need to heal, and those who created the crisis are no longer in a position to solve it,” Supervisor Ann Mallek said. “I look forward to news that will show that our school board is stepping up.”
“Our goal is not to assign blame or undermine our school system,” Supervisor Fred Missel said. “It is to help ensure that our schools are places where students thrive, educators feel supported, parents are heard, and public trust is earned through actions, not simply words.”
“ACPS is in a crisis,” Duncan said. “Everyone sees it, except, it seems, the only people with the constitutional authority to do something about it.”
“The crisis has been allowed to become too large,” she said. “There are too many facets. There are too many legal issues and too many people involved for this to be handled by six people who are not experts and who are doing a part-time job.”
Duncan’s criticism echoed concerns from former at-large school board member Allison Spillman in a late-August interview with C-VILLE. “We are elected officials getting paid $16,000 a year,” she said. Per hour of school board work the average member does weekly, she said, that works out to “way less than minimum wage.”
“You’re asking those ordinary citizens to step up to the plate to bear this burden,” Spillman said. “But they have to maintain full-time jobs because this doesn’t pay a full-time salary.”
Asked whether he would support making school board appointments full-time, salaried positions, state Sen. Creigh Deeds says he’d have to think about it. “Historically, school boards have hired administrations, superintendents, who actually run the schools,” Deeds says. “I am not certain what has happened in Albemarle County in the past year warrants changing that. In my view, school boards have become too politicized in general. The focus needs to be on providing all young people with the best education and opportunity possible.”
On October 17, the Albemarle County School Board released a statement inviting the Board of Supervisors to a joint work session in November to “share more about our current practices, hear the Supervisors’ priorities directly, and agree together on the appropriate next steps and the resources needed to support them.”
The school board’s statement reiterated its existing policies on reporting suspected abuse, emphasizing that it forbids retaliation against staff who report such suspicions. “For too long,” the statement read, “the school division has failed to invest in the essential systems and infrastructure necessary to be responsive to the needs of a school division our size.” The district blamed this lack of investment for its ability to respond to community Freedom of Information Act requests more quickly and thoroughly.
Under an amendment to Virginia law passed in 2003, school divisions must work with local law enforcement to establish written protocols for child abuse investigations. “Our Chief Legal Officer has been working with the County Attorney to finalize the agreement,” the statement reads. Questions to the school district about when that work began, and why the district didn’t already have such an agreement in place, had not received replies at press time.
According to the statement, the school board and acting Superintendent Chandra Hayes have already met with Jenna Conway, Virginia’s superintendent of public education, about what the district should do next, and which concerns it should prioritize.
The school board also released a two-page letter from law firm Harman Claytor Corrigan & Wellman, which is leading an outside investigation into the sexual abuse case against former employee Michael Swiney and the district’s response to it. As Hollymead parent and Albemarle County Republican Committee chairman Phil Riese wrote in a press release, the letter reveals that the investigation was ordered and is funded by VACorp, the school district’s insurance company.
“”Parents cannot trust an investigation paid for by the insurance company that pays victims less when it finds less,” Riese’s statement says, calling for a fully independent investigation with whistleblower protections.
The Albemarle County School Board’s next meeting is scheduled for October 22.
