Teacher faces termination for using sick days to attend concert, Ohio district says
An Ohio teacher is facing termination for calling in sick to attend a concert, according to district records.
The Lakota West High School English teacher is accused of falsifying sick leave on Feb. 8 and 9 to attend a concert in Nashville, according to an April 3 Lakota Local School District Board of Education resolution approving her suspension.
“She informed several colleagues that she was attending a concert in Nashville, while taking sick leave from the District,” the resolution states.
Officials say the teacher, who refused to answer questions about her whereabouts during a predisciplinary meeting, violated her teacher’s union contract, the state’s sick leave code and multiple board policies.
According to Ohio’s state code for those employed by the board of education, sick leave may be used for “absence due to personal illness, pregnancy, injury, exposure to contagious disease which could be communicated to others, and for absence due to illness, injury, or death in the employee’s immediate family.”
On the recommendation of the Lakota Local Schools superintendent, the board unanimously voted to suspend the teacher without pay starting April 4 and to move forward with termination proceedings April 22 unless a demand for a hearing is filed, the approved resolution states.
McClatchy News reached out to the teacher, the Lakota Local School District Board of Education and Lakota West High School for comment April 5 but did not receive an immediate response.
The educator is also a member of the board of education at nearby Loveland City School District.
The Lakota and Loveland school districts are located in the northern Cincinnati suburbs.
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