LETTER OF DEFICIENCY AND SUSPENSION

December 15, 2014

Employee
Rosemount Elementary School
Dear Employee
This letter constitutes a formal notice of deficiency and disciplinary action being taken as
a result of your performance and unprofessional conduct as a special education teacher
at Rosemount Elementary School. This letter also contains directives that you are
expected to comply with to remedy your deficiencies.
FACTS
We met with you on November 17, 2014 and December 4, 2014 along with SStaff
human resources coordinator, Staff DCUE president (present November 11 only) and
Staff , Education Minnesota representative to share concerns regarding your
performance and conduct as a special education teacher and to ask you questions
regarding your alleged actions. This section of the letter summarizes the concerns
discussed.
You received a Letter of Deficiency on May 8, 2014 and as part of the corrective action,
we met with you frequently during the first two months of the 2014-15 school year to
share expectations, answer questions and provide support on the role and
responsibilities of a Special Education Resource Teacher. Subsequent to those
meetings the following concerns have come to our attention.
It was reported and observed that you have not been servicing students consistently.
We discussed specific instances when you were either late or completely missed groups
of students. We determined you had not provided social skills services to a certain
student, who was listed on your schedule since the beginning of the school year, until
the week of December 1. You had been incorrectly servicing another student with the
same first name. You acknowledged this error in service. When asked how you
completed a progress report for the student you stated that you saw him during check in
and check out and he stopped once in a while during the day.

You were provided with initial Leveled Literacy Intervention (LLI) training on September
23 and 24 and yet did not start using LLI with your students as shown by the reading
records until late October and have not followed the LLI protocol consistently as Tom
observed on November 3. You stated you had not had some of these students such as
MS in your group until late October and that the prior reading records had been
administered by another teacher, but it was confirmed that MS had been in your group
since you had attended the training and on your caseload since the third week of school.
When attending the 2-day LLI training in November, you failed to prepare and bring a
video with you that was required for the training. Also, the lesson plans you left for the
substitute on first day of training were inadequate. The substitute had to seek assistance
from other staff to prepare for the day. You stated that no one told you how to make a
video and that the other teachers left similar lesson plans.
We reviewed the data you have been collecting for AVMR, LLI and Social Skills and
found that it was inadequate, insufficient and didnt provide information needed to guide
your instruction and monitor student progress. You stated you also had data you were
using from your interactions and observations of your students but that it wasnt written
down anywhere.
We shared concerns that you did not follow the listed protocol when administering the
Woodcock Johnson assessment with a student (MS). You said you thought the test
protocol was to ceiling out at 5 incorrect answers although we pointed out that the
instructions at the top of the page state you stop after 6 incorrect responses and the test
booklet shows that you stopped after as few as 2 or 3 or as many as 14 incorrect
answers. You were asked to have another licensed staff person observe when you
administered the W-J assessment but you continued administering the assessment even
when the teacher left the classroom because you said the student was doing so well.
The students evaluation plan states that testing should be completed in short segments.
You stated you gave the student breaks during the 65 minutes of testing but they were
not noted in the assessment booklet. You stated you used a timer rather than noting
start/stop times in the booklet. Inaccurate test results were reported and the evaluation
report for MS was determined to be invalid.
One of your students (KL) who receives a significant number of minutes per day based
on his IEP has a primary disability of EBD. We shared our concerns that the teachers
that work with him throughout the day have limited knowledge of his behavior plan and
Positive Behavior Support Plan (PBSP). These teachers stated that you have not
consulted with them about his plan or levels of support. We also shared our concerns
about the lack of data, teaching points and specific interventions as outlined in his
Functional Behavior Assessment and PBSP. You stated that you have not met with his
teacher within the last week but that had talked with the teacher maybe two times in the

last month. You stated you also give them status sheets with your contact information
listed. You stated that his instructional needs and plans are always changing. You
stated that he has a point chart but it is not communicated to KL; instead, two different
sticker charts are used and one is turned in for a monthly reward.
In the area of due process there have been several incomplete and or inaccurate
documents submitted to the child study secretary. We already discussed the
inaccuracies in the W-J assessment for student MS. On one CS2 you indicated
incorrect areas of that would be assessed. The student was discontinued from
Occupational Therapy service and you indicated that OT would be assessed in this reevaluation. On an IEP for sudent you indicated in the adaptations section medication
management with no further explanation. This is not something a case manager would
provide and or put into an adaptation section of an IEP. You are not clearly
communicating and or completing case manager responsibilities. You have presented
incomplete and or inaccurate paperwork, which results in confusion among other
professionals in your building. We are concerned that internal timelines are not being
met. We are also concerned with your ability to accurately complete due
process/paperwork procedures.
We shared concerns about your professional judgment in instances of talking to
students, or about students to staff while students were present, such as telling your
students about a disability you had that might have caused you to be in a wheelchair.
You told another staff person in the presence of the student that he was having a
meltdown and the other staff person felt that the manner in which you shared the
information seemed to be mocking the student. You stated the student had been
bullying others and you wanted them to know he was being called out for poor behavior,
not his anxiety, and didnt want them to give him comfort for things for which he was
being held accountable. On December 3, Tom intervened when you were in the process
of taking a kindergarten student by a classroom in an attempt to modify the behavior of
another older student who was misbehaving. You said the older student wouldnt come
out of the room and he was always so responsive to the kindergarten student that you
felt he might respond in front of her.
CAUSE FOR DISCIPLINARY ACTION
The cause for disciplinary action is as follows:

You failed to provide consistent service to your students, arriving late or missing
groups on multiple occasions and not providing service at all to one student for
the first two months of the school year as listed on your schedule and required by

his IEP. You put yourself, the school and district at risk for not providing required
services as well as impacting the students involved.
You inaccurately administered the Woodcock-Johnson assessment and you
reported incorrect data in the IEP you prepared for a student. The assessment
will have to be redone and the IEP delayed as a result. This also creates a
liability for the District.
You failed in implement LLI with your students in a timely manner and have not
followed the protocols consistently.
Your data collection in math, LLI and social skills is inadequate and inaccurate
and you are not consistently using data to monitor student performance, guide
instruction and drive student specific strategies to share with classroom teachers.
You have not completed due process paperwork in a timely, accurate and
complete manner and have not communicated clearly with other staff involved in
the process. This has caused confusion and extra work for other staff, as well as
creating liability.
Your conduct demonstrates a lack of professional judgment, conduct unbecoming
a teacher, violation of school laws, rules, regulations and directives, inefficiency
and neglect of duty.
CORRECTIVE ACTION

You are to adhere to the following directives:

1. You will complete all duties of your position using current district, department and
building practices and as required by state and federal law.
2. You will demonstrate appropriate boundaries and judgment when providing
service to students or talking to or about them.
3. We will schedule a meeting to begin the implementation of an Intensive
Assistance Plan to address your deficiencies.
These directives will remain in effect unless we inform you in writing that they cease to
apply. You must also take any additional steps that you believe are necessary and
appropriate to correct your deficiencies.
This action is taken to put you on notice of our future expectations for your performance
and conduct.

DISCIPLINARY ACTION
This letter of deficiency constitutes a formal written reprimand in this matter and will
become part of your personnel file in District 196. You are also suspended from
teaching for five (5) days without pay beginning Monday, December 15 through Friday,
December 19, 2014. You will resume work on Monday, January 5, 2015.
The district expects immediate and sustained improvement in your performance. Your
failure to comply with the corrective action contained in this letter, or a reoccurrence of
similar conduct in the future, will result in further disciplinary action up to and including
the possibility of termination of your employment from the School District.
If you have any questions about or do not fully understand anything in this letter or the
standard to which you will be held in the future you are directed to contact me
immediately. If you do not do so, you will be deemed to fully understand the information
and directives in this letter and the standard to which you will be held in the future.
I also caution you that you may not engage in any retaliation toward staff members,
students or others who participated in this investigation. Any retaliation by you will
constitute grounds for disciplinary action.
Sincerely,

Tom Idstrom
Principal, Rosemount Elementary School
cc:

Director of Elementary Education

Director of Special Education
Human Resources Coordinator
DCUE President
Personnel File

staff
Special Education Coordinator