-By Larry Sand

A scandal has erupted at California’s Commission on Teacher Credentialing, which exists to evaluate teachers and protect children from those who should not be in the classroom.

Its mission is to “ensure integrity and high quality in the preparation, conduct and professional growth of the educators who serve California’s public schools.” The commission includes teachers, school board members and the state superintendent of public instruction. But a recent explosive report has revealed that instead of being a champion of children, the commission is a callous, self-serving club that ignores its mandated duties.

The first sign that something was amiss came in 2009 when commission lawyer Kathleen Carroll, sensing deep problems within the commission, began asking a lot of questions. In December 2010, she was fired.

Then, in April of this year, State Auditor Elaine Howle released a report that blew the lid off “one of the worst state run agencies” in California.

The report describes a backlog of 12,600 unprocessed reports of arrest and prosecution of educators as of 2009 — almost three times a typical annual workload. In 40 percent of the cases reviewed, after a report of misconduct was received, it took almost three months to even open a case. After receiving court documents that a teacher was convicted of a crime requiring mandatory revocation of the credential, it sometimes took months to actually revoke it….

Read the rest at The Mercury News.

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