FBI probe into teacher hirings must dig deep MARK GUYDISH OPINION

If the feds are really digging into school teacher hirings during the last few years, they’re not going to get the job done with a pair of special agents and a shovel.

They need an army of investigators and a bevy of oversized backhoes. They could probably use tunneling equipment sufficient to undermine half the region, too.

Consider only the five districts that make up the Wilkes-Barre Area Career and Technical Center, and the center itself. I pick those because, so far, that’s where the G-men have gone. The Career Center is run jointly by Wilkes-Barre Area, Pittston Area, Greater Nanticoke Area, Hanover Area and Crestwood. Investigators have been to the center and the first two districts.

According to state data for the 2007-08 school year – the latest available – those five districts and one Career Center had a total of 1,970 professional staff, which primarily means teachers but includes administrators.

Let’s assume the feds are just looking at hirings since the 2004-05 school year, which seems to be the cutoff point for most documents they have sought. In the 2007-08 data, teachers who had been hired in 2004-05 or later would be listed as having three years experience.

They may have additional experience outside the district, but that’s not particularly relevant.

The five districts and Career Center combined have 414 people with three years experience at their current districts. That’s 21 percent – more than one-fifth – of all the teachers and administrators. And that doesn’t include anyone hired in the past year.

Go back another year, to teachers with four years experience, and the feds are looking at 625 employees hired in the five districts and the Career Center. That’s nearly a third the total.

Interviews galore

That’s a heck of a lot of interviews, and that’s just those who were hired. The FBI has also asked for info from people who believe they weren’t hired because they refused to pay to work. In high schools, that may not be a lot of applicants, thanks to the need for specific certification in each subject. In elementary schools, districts routinely get scores, even hundreds, of applicants for one job.

I’m only looking at half the districts, and one of three career centers, in Luzerne County. The Scranton FBI office, which serves eight counties, asked for information throughout Northeastern Pennsylvania.

To me, such vast numbers have always been a bit of a rebuttal to the age-old claim that “you have to know someone to get a teaching job.” I’ll be 52 next week, and I’ve heard that lament, as well as relentless claims of paying for teaching jobs, since high school.

This is what the statistics say: Well over 600 people hired in just five districts and one career center in the last five or so years, and we are supposed to believe every one of them is related by blood or friendship by someone on the school boards or in the district?

I’m not saying it’s untrue. Quite the contrary, our paper has reported numerous cases of school district nepotism and cronyism in my 14 years here. It’s a favorite topic.

The fact that such complaints have been rife for so long certainly suggests there has to be fire amid so much smoke. But the sheer number of people who have been hired suggests it is an exaggeration to say everybody who got a job was connected to somebody giving out jobs.

The truth surely lies somewhere in the middle. Here’s hoping the feds find it, and soon.

Overcast 56°

Federal Investigation of Schools

Interviews galore

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