WILLMAR -- For the second time in a month, a parent has spoken to the Willmar School Board about the conduct of a special education teacher in the district.
Kathy Myrick said she came to the School Board meeting Monday to stand beside Jackie Nelson, who spoke at a board meeting in January and asked board members to fire the teacher. The teacher has not been identified publicly.
A state investigation report was released last month detailing the teacher's treatment of Nelson's daughter over two years. Another state investigation is also ongoing regarding that teacher and child.
Myrick said the same teacher taught her son. She told a story of being called to school to calm her son, only to be told she couldn't enter the classroom, though she could hear him sobbing inside. When she entered anyway, she was told she couldn't go to him. She said she went to him anyway, and while she was comforting him she watched the teacher with other students.
She watched the teacher snap her fingers in children's faces, she said, and she heard the teacher tell a child, "You will act like a third grader." Similar comments were recorded in the state investigation report regarding Nelson's child.
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Since her son has transferred to another school in the district, he has no behavioral issues, and he requires much less medication than he did before, Myrick said.
"He didn't want to go to school," she said, and she had to carry him, kicking and screaming, into the school last year. Now, he likes school, and he is only now beginning to tell her what happened at his old school, she added.
"This treatment of children must stop," Myrick said.
Board members did not comment after Jackie Nelson spoke to them a month ago, but they did respond to Myrick.
"We are fully aware of what is going on," said board member Brad Schmidt. However, because of the ongoing investigation, board members are not able to make comments on the situation, he said.
The situation involves private educational data of children and private personnel data, and school officials are limited in what they can say, Superintendent Kathy Leedom said after the board meeting.
Asked whether the teacher is still teaching in the Willmar schools, she said, "I can't comment on any aspect of it at this point."
Board Chairman Mike Carlson said board members are trying to follow proper procedure during the investigation.
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"Our silence does not reflect the fact that we're not aware of what's going on," he said. "We are fully in the loop."
