Why did it take so long to expose Steve Riddle as a person of unsavory character? There were numerous signs, warnings and charges filed against him and staff members at Leverette who were preying on not only the children but women also.
There are those who want to blame the students and parents for a failing school. But the climate of the school is a large component of success or failure. Leverette is a new school and the students should have had a level playing field but for the sexualization of the climate in the school. We have long said that Leverette did not have an atmosphere conducive to learning.
John Foley, Dan Burns and others ignored the signs and in the process children were/are damaged, along with some staff members.
The Harassment Committee needs to be fired and a system put in place that protects the learning atmosphere for students and staff. There needs to be a cleaning house at Leverette and at the Thurgood Marshall building, ironically two buildings across the
street from each other.
http://toledoonthemove.com/uploaded.files/wnwo/News/Stories/steve%riddle...
http://swampbubbles.com/toledo-public-schools-employee-charged-sexually-...
Purnhrt;
NOW I have lots of questions running thru my mind, some that you could probably answer, I'm sure.?
Is the Harrassment Committee a Union committee or a mgmt. comm?
What were there findings in this matter?
Twila, no reform will work if you insist on policies that keep the matter internal. Kept internal, the matter can be ignored or covered up.
We need a law that is very simple: Any formal complaint must be published in the local newspaper within 5 business days, upon pain of committing a misdemeanor. The accuser walks up to the school or admin building with a form easily available online, and gets the complaint datestamped by the school clerk. If the complaint isn't found in the local newspaper within 5 business days, the accuser can bring a charge against the clerk.
For those of us uncomfortable with the idea of a newspaper error creating a legal problem for a clerk, then the law can mandate a webpage instead. The TPS already maintains a website, so that's not a hardship. The law could specify "provable public notice" -- some form of public notice that can be copied and datestamped in some usual legal fashion. So that could mean a newspaper OR a webpage.
For those of us concerned with privacy and reputation, then the published complaint can be anonymized with numbers for the accused ... administrator 2, teacher 14, staff 4, etc. These numbers can remain secret at the level of the administration. After all, if you trust an internal complaint system now, and you've always done so, then trusting such a secret database should be easy for you.
In this fashion, the people are informed, and can even track what's going on.
If such a system was put in place, even accounting for false positives (which are easily handled with the same law mandating updates for the accusations), Riddle would have either been out on his posterior long ago, or he would have stopped committing those crimes. I'm good with either result.
Toledo could lead the pack in this sort of thing. After all, the TPS wants transparency, right? LOL! Accountability, right? LOL! Well, perhaps Toledo isn't the place to find social advances.
GZ: I don't think that will work. Consider the screwy accusations and flame wars you get on SB, TT, etc. then turn this same behavior loose in a public forum of some sort. Hiding the names of the accused defeats the purpose, as no one will care if Teach 33 at school 4 is accused of anything.
One thing that makes sense to me is to allow the general public to monitor the classes in person. Record each class and make the recordings public. If a parent wants to complain about something, evidence will be immediate and the complaint can be resolved very quickly.
Mad Jack
Mad Jack's Shack
TPS has a policy which should address the complaint process. It is called a Public Complaint. I don't have one with me but will post it when I can. Basically it could be used as you state, since it is a Public Complaint. We have filed numerous ones but they are either covered up or put in a drawer somewhere.
Darlene Fisher who was on the policy committee tried her best for over a year to address the Public Complaint process. TPS can no longer take baby steps when it comes to the protection of students, academically and physically.
Giant steps need to be taken in order for the social advances you are talking about to come into play.
http://toledoonthemove.com/uploaded.files/wnwo/News/Stories/steve%riddle...
the link is not working. It shows the text messages that Principal Riddle sent to the young person and also a couple of complaints filed by staff alleging sexual harassment and racial harassment. I will see if I can find it another way. Sorry.
toledoonthemove and steve riddle. You will be able to see the text messages and the complaints filed by staff.
The complaints filed tie in with the other link where Riddle and his behavior was being discussed on Swamp bubbles.
How many other pedophiles are teaching/working in TPS?
This guy "had no shame in his game" !!! I finally read the transcripts from the 'TEXT MESSAGES" THAT HE SENT TO THE STUDENT. Why wasn't he worried about getting caught? Was that feeling of "getting away with something" what motivated his SICK little mind!
I wonder what other little girls has he done this too, or said things inappropiate too.
I also wonder what other adult females, did he do this too? They all need to come forward, the fear of retaliation must be really intimidating for them.[ the victims].
Purnhrt, I SALUTE YOU!!!!!! YOU ARE RIGHT , THE WHOLE TPS SCHOOL SYSTEM NEEDS TO BE CLEANSED OF INCOMPTENT EMPLOYEES OF ALL STRIPES!!!
TPS ; WHAT TOOK SO LONG TO ADDRESS THIS MESS???? Did you think that it would just go away?
Give them an inch and they will take a mile. Have you EVER heard of that!
THE WHOLE TPS SCHOOL SYSTEM NEEDS TO BE CLEANSED OF INCOMPTENT EMPLOYEES OF ALL STRIPES!!!
TPS ; WHAT TOOK SO LONG TO ADDRESS THIS MESS????
And who keeps keeping the same folks in charge year after year?? If Toledo would stop electing BOE members based on the letter behind their name instead of looking at qualifications, we might get better service out of our board, and better vetted personnel.
vindictive and incompetent leaders. Anyone attempting to bring issues to the surface are shot down by retaliation in any form that is possible, even if it means using children. Toledo shoots the messenger AND kills the message.
For instance the last school board election was run by instituting a whisper campaign against anyone who wanted real systemic change. Such as-whispering ***"sh, don't tell anybody but Darlene Fisher is a racist.*****" whisper "she is a troublemaker" shh she can't make up her mind*****shhh >>don't tell<<
It is a city with a great racial divide, one that no one wishes to change because it keeps incompetents in power and the money flowing into the big, black, deep hole.
Billy, it is people like you, who throw a rock and then hide your hand that elect the leaders that control Toledo with the unseen hand......
many a concerned citizen in toledo has made both formal and non formal complaints on steven riddle in the past about his sexual inapropriate behavior and tps did nothing. my wife and i made complaints on him to john foley over a year ago and we have the sent e-mais to prove it and he dismissed us like were were nothing. we took our kids our the school the next semester.
monitoring Mr. Riddle and Leverette for a few years because we have had complaints from parents and students concerning his inappropriate behavior and the inappropriate behavior of some of his staff.
We also filed complaints with Foley, Dan Burns, Toledo Police, Lucas County Children Services and the Department of Justice. No one took the complaints seriously thus children were harmed.
Because Mr. Riddle was able to navigate the system by getting away with his behavior, he escalated his behavior till he got caught and couldn't escape.