I wanted to thank Mr. Franklin for his recent letter to the editor on April 24, 2024. Although there were factual inaccuracies in his response, continuing the dialogue about issues at the Ocean Beach School District only encourages more discussion and thereby transparency of this district and school board. However, Mr. Franklin missed the point of my letter two weeks prior.

How can we as a community have trust and confidence in this superintendent and school board, who gave safe harbor to a teacher who incurred years of documented workplace harassment, intimidation, and bullying of staff, teachers, students and parents, and who allowed him to retain his position and remain on the taxpayers’ payroll? Yet, when this teacher, Mr. Shawn Stern, received his last disciplinary reprimand, this district and school board intentionally chose not to terminate his contract for the documented “just cause.” Rather, when Mr. Stern was at the end of his rope, this district and school board, seemingly, rewarded Mr. Stern by throwing him a lifeline of $90,696.68, hoping secretly that it would never come to the surface. Many questions remain:

1. How did Mr. Stern incur a years’ long disciplinary record? Did Mr. Stern receive preferential treatment by the school board and the district because he is married to the superintendent?

2. We learned through district Human Resources Director Jim Paxinos’ own text about Mr. Stern’s resignation agreement that “…Amy approved it….” Were the school board and district’s judgments clouded?

3. Has the payout to Mr. Stern set a precedent regarding future negotiations of teachers in this district, regardless of disciplinary standing, whereby teachers could simply choose to resign at the beginning of their contract year and demand a full contract payout?

How much exposure has this poor judgment and lack of forethought by this administration and school board left us as a community?

Please join your community at the next school board meeting on Wednesday, May 22, at 5:30 p.m.

DON CROOK

Ocean Park