The Fox Board of Education voted 4-1 at a special meeting last night (Sept. 9) to rescind the recent employment of Sophia Hermann, the daughter of longtime board member Cheryl Hermann.
Sophia Hermann was hired Aug. 19 as a teacher’s aide in the special education program at Simpson Elementary School and was earning $9.87 an hour.
She began working Aug. 14 and was working about 32.5 hours a week, said acting Superintendent Tim Crutchley.
School board member Dan Kroupa said he asked for the special meeting to reconsider her employment because she was related to a board member and he and other board members didn’t know about the relationship when they voted to hire her.
Sophia Hermann was one of 41 people included on a list of classified staff hired on Aug. 19. Two certified staff members and six substitute teachers were hired that night as well. In addition, the board approved “staff separations” for 33 employees who had quit, retired or ended their employment or planned to soon do so. The board also approved employment modifications for four certified and two classified staff members.
The board typically votes on all the personnel issues at one time, as was the case on Aug. 19. Cheryl Hermann abstained from the vote.
Kroupa said he didn’t notice Sophia Hermann’s name on the list at the time and just realized over the weekend that she had been hired, so he called for the special meeting to discuss the issue.
He said that on Aug. 19, before the board voted on the personnel matters, he asked assistant superintendent Todd Scott, who’s in charge of human resources, if there was anything about any of the proposed hires the board should know, and Scott said no.
“Then, I find out Cheryl’s daughter was on the list,” Kroupa said today (Sept. 10). “I guess it wasn’t the right way to ask what I wanted. I should have said is there anybody who’s related or not qualified?”
Kroupa also said that Cheryl Hermann’s abstention from the vote didn’t cause him to question the list because it’s common for a board member to abstain from personnel-related issues since most of them have relatives who work at the district.
Kroupa said he has a daughter who’s a teacher in the district.
“She’s been working there six years,” said Kroupa, who was elected in 2013.
Fellow board member David Palmer’s wife is the director of nursing, and he has a son and a niece who are teachers in the district.
Board member Vernon Sullivan has one son who’s an athletic director and assistant principal and another who’s a teacher in the district.
In addition, Steve Holloway, another board member, has a wife who’s a teacher in the district, and Hermann has a niece who’s a district teacher.
Many, but not all, of the school board members’ family members already held those jobs when the board members were elected.
With recent complaints about nepotism and cronyism in the district, Kroupa said the board needs to be more careful about hiring relatives.
“We can’t be doing this kind of stuff,” he said. “The public is incensed, and we can’t say, ‘We don’t care what you think; we’re going to keep hiring relatives.’”
Kroupa said he talked to Crutchley and four other school board members and none of them had noticed Sophia Hermann’s name on the Aug. 19 hiring list.
Today, Crutchley said he had only scanned the list and didn’t notice Sophia Hermann’s name on it, and that’s why he didn’t bring it up at the meeting.
Kroupa said he thinks either Cheryl Hermann or Todd Scott should have mentioned it before the Aug. 19 vote.
Cheryl Hermann couldn’t be reached for comment today.
Scott said about 60 or 70 people applied for that aide position, as well as others that were filled, adding that there are still more aide jobs open.
He also said that Sophia Hermann was qualified for the aide job, which called for a “smart, level-headed person” with experience working with children with special needs and a “desire to make a difference.”
He said the job called for someone with a high school diploma or equivalent, and Sophia Hermann is a Seckman High School graduate and has “some college.”
She also “had experience working with high-needs autistic children” and “was the most qualified applicant we had,” Scott said.
She has a “calm, cool demeanor,” he added, and a “passion for working with children who have special needs.”
Kroupa said he wanted to hear all that earlier.
“I told Todd that was the answer he should have given me (on Aug. 19). I told him what was happening was his fault,” Kroupa said. “I chewed him good. I asked a question at the meeting where it (the hire) took place, and even though it wasn’t the perfect question, everyone knew what was going on, what I meant.”
At last night’s meeting the board re-voted on all the Aug. 19 hires.
First, the board voted 6-0 to hire everyone on the Aug. 19 list, except for Sophia Hermann.
Then, the board had a separate vote on whether to hire her, and it failed by a vote of 1-4, with Palmer voting in favor and Cheryl Hermann abstaining.
Sullivan was absent.
Cheryl Hermann tried to make a comment about her daughter’s employment, but board president John Laughlin said she couldn’t weigh in on the matter, Kroupa said.
Sophia Hermann’s last day on the job was Tuesday, Crutchley said.
Kroupa said the board didn’t rescind Sophia Hermann’s employment because she wasn’t qualified.
“I have nothing against her,” he said. “I’m sure she’s qualified. That wasn’t the issue. We have to build the trust of the community back in the school district, and we can’t do it by doing those kinds of things.”
Kroupa also said it wasn't against district policy to hire Sophia Hermann, so that wasn't why her employment was rescinded either.
The district’s nepotism policy only prohibits the board from hiring relatives for administrative or supervisory positions.
However, Laughlin said he wants to revisit the nepotism policy.
Crutchley said he’s going to present a change to the policy that would prohibit the hiring of any board members’ relatives.