e he did say that that's true but it's inherent credibility determinations are inherent in his findings in the session because he said at the end of the day the school board has completely failed to put to you prevail on any of the in the witnesses that were produced on her behalf so they asked that's the situation i think it's safe to say from the record i think we can we can look at what the hearing officer finder has to make a determination as to which witnesses to  trying to prove to the hearing officer satisfaction of the shooter charges that have the level that you look at as level against or but then at the end of the day when the hearing officer has made this determination as he did here the only way they can reverse that is if it's against the man it was for you not because they would have reached a different conclusion had a different opinion of course get a different opinion they could have a different opinion they would have brought the charges i mean it's kind of a circular argument here so in terms of who's the fact finder of counsel brought up for the school work brought up in their response that they start talking about the chicago cases and even the chicago cases the courts have that the hearing officer is the fact the hearing officer is making the credibility determinations and it doesn't make sense under the twenty four new parties as to be supplied by the only state board of education has to go through special training why do you need that you know him from we can just say at the end of the day we don't like what he but he said if they have the power to modify that they have a power to contract with hearing officers they are it's people it's creatures they are it's not the situation here in downstate tenured teacher dismissal cases instead you have to go to school outside your school district you the school board and the findings of the hearing because if all that is is finally to see determination and we don't care what the hearing officer said and if the school district position in this him but i don't think that's what the statute says and if we're going to follow the statute we have to give meaning to every portion of that statute and if we're going to follow what the school board says that we should do in this case we might as well just make teachers that will because when the legislature does something we have to we have to look at what they actually did and look at the words they used in the words that they used so yes we do have that by we're already we're not arguing that but it's a very limited  difficult to apply standard here to to say that you know you're going to be able you're not going to be able to retain in the first what hearing officer recommends he can't do it because you have to buy this now just wait standard that's what the eight says to supplement yes ok so we're but we're here looking now at a review of the circuit boards review of this whole matter right and so it has on the table hearing officer recommendation and also a board that has taken action in arguably supplemented or modified so there is an implicit  or there's one specific contested point that we feel is just is that there's the evidence is one thing on for some reason they said everything that we set out to prove we proved even though the hearing officer didn't s longnecker we have testimony by a teacher i believe there interviewed a student on all of those things is there something there in evidence that would support the decision of this muscle if you just the vote that way if you to support the decision to dismissal yes i would say no there's a lot of testimony on that is totally independent of credibility here the physical evidence of this scene now what they did out there those that had this list of numbers in the test booklet that comes down to do you believe angele mitchell or not and the hearing officer was in the better position to make that determination first of all he's a neutral he's independent of the schedule gives him  i take it that they're not hearing other witnesses no not so what they have is they have a record run but they take this record and this testimony and they have a power over this branch already to make german nations and when they clearly it is not supported by the evidence so that we were doing the things that yeah i mean are you substituting the will you can't substitute credibility determinations you can't substitute your own judgement and certainly in this case where the school board has a very  support that's not consistent with the language or the spirit of the statute itself i think the best argument that the school district half is that well the  legislature intended to give a gun state school district the you know the opportunity to terminate a teacher to actually have some input into the process we agree but that's not the point we're not arguing that point the point is what restrictions google legislature put out and i believe the legislature put some very significant restrictions on there will be a boon was i mean you're arguing that the role of the said it supplement modified only based on this record that's before them that's one thing they can go by they're not taking new evidence they're not taking these they're not supplementing  record they're supplementing a decision or modifying the system right they like they have the right to either modify what was already decided or apples i guess with your supplement you can add other decisions right disagree with effect finder you don't have to explain why you think it was right or wrong or why you think why we really could have found a different way but we will we have to go along with it because of the manifest way standard there's some evidence to support that position oh so it does look this court doesn't have to make that kind of an explanation when we say modify or supplement in the words used in the statute is also used in d n a is we have to explain the school district is required to explain why it's modifying supplementing why what is what doing what it's doing so it's it's it's giving a little bit more than a standard manifest weight review but it also is compelling the school district to explain why it's doing it and when the school board explained why they did here is is just simply believe anything that the money maker said and we believe everything that mitchell s the opposite conclusion clearly apparent on this record is there merely a substitution of credibility determinations or substitution of judgment we believe that you know you made the wrong decision if those are the kinds of things that the hit the school district is offering as its explanation then it has failed in its in its obligation to justify any supplementation or modification of the hearing officers recommendations and hearings that either conclusion could have been supported based on the other that's right and the you know you're you're faced with that frequently right and the question is only comes up when ends up the side of the day as the deference given has been given the authority to supplement or modify but not to to supplement or modify by substituting entirely its own credibility determinations its own judgment its own preconceived  instance where you know we're talking about what kind of supplement patient could be appropriate where they could say well here at the school district the hearing officer phil to include the testimony of these three with two witnesses in this case  those two witnesses had something to say that was really dispositive which is not the case here but if they did a hypothetical then then now maybe i've got a basis on  jones testified exact you know in support of the position of the british here so that would be a possible way i think that you could in that limited situations the base court stated  those clearing officers are there people but in this case under christic if you if you're not richard is not the school boards person this is the hearing officer is in fact is required under twenty four twelve to be somebody outside to be representing the school districts in this case which deals with the procedure for terminating teachers for a closet or below in our school quote on specifically the school board's role as your honour's are all very familiar with  in when that change was made the hearing officer was given the ultimate authority deference hearing officers decision was final and that or could not supplement or modify the hearing officers fi the remedy in the seventy five to two thousand and eleven time period was was under the administrative review law where the appellate court would review the hearing officers decision under a manifest weight since which is essentially what you claim this case is asking you to do however in two thousand and eleven the state legislature heavily revised the statute for teacher tenure teacher terminations under the illinois amendments were based on the comments of the the bill sponsors and so forth the amendments were designed to return to the local school board the final say in this missile cases it made it more similar oh i'll be a different more similar to that priest nine hundred seventy five process in the process used for chicago school kids it's alternately the intent of the takes away any deference to the hearing officer if we are in a situation where this court has to say well the hearing officers findings are reviewed under the manifest weight standard then the changes made in two hearing officer does make findings of fact and recommendation in those are incorporate the findings of fact anyway are incorporated into the school board's final written order and in this case on the very first page of final written order it does say except where were shall incorporate the hearing officers findings of fact does not say the school board has to incorporate the recommendation of the hearing officer except that the school board a modifier supplement the findings of fact if it's a pain in the school board's so there seems to be fully two levels here if you take the finding of the hearing officer and you're not allowed to change it you're less i like two different things you to be reviewing off the court right now your initial finding that the hearing officers opinions against memphis the evidence and then your final conclusion looking at the record on your final conclusion is is that  says it says the court on the view shall you have consideration to not deference nothing else to the school board's decision and it supplemental findings of fact if apple and the hearing officers findings of fact and recommendation terminate teacher terminations contact says as you see that standard i think team probably didn't directly but oh my point is is that if they if your thing that is the well i think if you and that's why i think it's important to look at what the wall was before in what the legislature intended which was to give control back keep the school board and make it so that it was libby gave control back to  that that is up is that a limitation on the power of war i think it's a it's an instruction to the board that they have to review what the hearing officer said the findings of fact they had me review i guess what i'm trying to wrap my head around this is going back to what i said earlier if you've got these two kinds of reviews if something is going to manifest with the evidence and you've got the because in many of these opinion was not against manifest whether the weight of the evidence i guess at that juncture then you go to them that would be contrary to the board's final decision because they based it on a fact or that but they have a limitation you know before they can modify supplement their limitation is they have to find that in their opinion that finding of fact from hearing officer was against the mouth as well you know right that is correct so if a court determines that therefore no supplement or model nation in the board's decision should be considered i don't think that's what the statute that says i don't think that that's where you can supplement or modify in this hypothetical the court on review would look at that whether that step one is in there or not i don't think that's the first step of the court's review of what is the first step the first step of the court's review is looking at the decision the final decision all the school board and saying is that decision against the manifest weight of the evidence in the case where the school board's decision that the hearing officers  findings were against the manifest way in the court feels that that's erroneous that's going to go to the ultimate determination as to whether the school board's decision was against the mouth us way  evidence that that's the test yes so if that's the test then there could be things in the record i guess hypothetically that could support that right i suppose hypothetically you can have a situation where the often finding by the board maybe could be based on some of those and maybe this isn't true but it seems to me that you could have a finding by the board that is based on this fixed given determined that was going to start here you're ignoring the limitation placed on the statute or if you i don't i don't think you are because it's all part of the record to get there if you if you have the board's decision and you say before you ever get to determine your sins on your own you have to make this other thing this other determination that seems to be a limitation on the power of the work getting to this awful thing because that like i decided was also supported by you know it's not going to memphis way the other but if you've got this first step that's a limitation on you've got to get through that before you go to your next step otherwise that has no meaning to say was acting properly when in supplement you know it's you know you're in i think that's all part of the course review of the school board's decision i mean part of the school board's decision is the supplement counsel my name is brian baer i'm from the firm with laurel see my firm also represents the board of education of the small these foods for thirty seven and i appreciate the opportunity to address you very briefly this afternoon i wanted to address you today because i was responsible for presenting the district's evidence before the hearing officer in this case and i think that without duplicating what mr slater has going into it he didn't want to reach back  why they did the things that they did in this public act they were known for being dismissed because they were attributing recall rights under reductionism for something similar but it was the very same standard that we're talking about today but by matrix by which all of these cases can be analyzed the supreme court may be doing that for us in the bags matter that rose up from up tomorrow that probably tomorrow is my expectation and what i would say is this the reason that i asked to address you today is that if there is that level of review on the intermediary step there i think that it is incumbent note that there was no mistakes made by the board of education in their decision to modify and supplement the hearing officer spines and that in this case here is the reason why i say that is this even though the hearing officer report is forty nine pages long it is not complete i not a full picture of the evidence that was presented at the hearing and we were in that room for five days working eight so five thirty on friday we worked until six o'clock we presented thirty seven exhibits six training exhibit counsel for ms longnecker presented well over twenty six exhibits of the rhone there was extensive testimony much of which is not reflected in the hearing officers report when i look at the hearing officers report to see findings the board of education modified i really can only point to three two of them were what i would say slightly incorrect at the record page c four thirty eight the hearing officer and noted what when i asked mr harris about on redirect which was when you view all of these scores in the aggregate is that where you're looking for the outlines for us that show that something unusual ha peterson was talking about data not being there to support the allegation he referred to that email in his discussion about the map assessments however her testimony very clearly shows that she was talking about the charges relating to the is this notion of this security check list the tests that were delivered in it this is the district exhibit fourteen this is a partial list there were eight hundred students in that school that took this test there are sixty five pages in this whole list and the fact that the district only presented these three pages these were the three pages that crystal harris  handed to her discovered in her classroom she did not say this student is not in my room she did not say this point that was not the literature here this issue was never the spirit ms dunn testified that she delivered all of th finding that the board failed to prove that this particular test booklet that was opened by ms longacre was actually delivered to her room that is against the manifest weight of the evidence in this particular case so if this court chooses to review that intermediary step if the supreme court in banks tells us that that's what we have to do i want it to be very clear that there was no mistake in regards to that because i believe that the i say that portion of these charges are the most most is all supplementation because as counsel from his long neck or in admits there is no explicit finding of credibility for any of these witnesses and if we go to a hearing officer for findings of fact and we don't get findings as to which and i think if you read the hearing officers forty nine pages you read the wards final twenty page supplemental final order you will see a well picture of the evidence and the first picture shows that the manifest weight of the evidence was overwhelmingly brief where we recite several facts about mr longest testimony that were inconsistent e mails that she sent talking about portions of work that she had completed which administrators then confronted her and she had to roll back her statements and say oh actually we weren't that far along she sent an e mail to mr humphries the superintendent and mr here is for principal saying i respect mr harris immensely she testified on the stand that wasn't true i really didn't respect him when they sent that e mail and most importantly on the final day of trial on friday afternoon at three forty five pm she finally testified for the first time never to anyone i was not the only room with ms mitchell at the time she claims that i open these test booklets at three forty five in the last it's right and we had to go back into the extensive level of documentation that we could preserve and locate the e mails that she sent and this was group exhibit thirty seven school district thirty seven that show ms longnecker test the in she admitted this sending these e mails over the period of time in which she claimed that she was walking the students down the hallway so the hearing officer failed to take note of th in the hearing officer did not incorporate i'm play frankly when i read the hearing officer report and i get to page forty nine the final finding that the school board has not met its burden i feel is quite a broad and there's there's so much luck that was never discussed and court correctly upheld that and i would ask you to do the same thank you very he's i don't feel that that's appropriate i think we're talking about the what the statute requires i think i listened carefully to look to counsel said i think he's more or less conceded what what the case is is all about that in order to review the decision of the school board under the statute the first thing that a review in court must do this court circuit court must first determination of this was indeed against the man as way to yes i was in fact right so i agreed to best the first level of review right there and we don't get to the second level review about what the school board get later if what the school board at first in you know reversing with the hearing officer did being against the manifest weight of the evidence we don't get to anything beyond that if we determine that indeed the hearing officers findings were supported by any evidence and were not against us what so then asked that i think is is a two step process i don't think we get the second step i think we buckled up this is not really what level of sunny consistent statements made or some some conflicting testimony that you can point to but that's why we have very officers in administrative review cases to make those credibility determination hear those facts and make conclusions based on the appearance demeanor testimony i contact whatever standards that people use in finding fans and then when we go to a final decision as well that's not what the united states because the nine says that you have to look at both what the school district says in changing the recommendations made by the officer and what the hearing officer you know let's give an board so they supplemented on that basis that's not contrary to the statute they have this order to do that no it's not necessarily conflict of the statute but what we're getting it in in a situation like this is where the hearing officer was faithless to his oath and chose to act as a partisan and ignore all contrary evidence and ignored  the evidence about that no no i know but i mean in terms of in terms of why i would do that why i would have the authority to do that i think you almost have to get to the to the to the face it was hearing officer situation before on you're going to get t of you know i suppose a human hearing officer this will come up with somebody who just just plain didn't get it and slept through the third day of the hearing i suppose they could have them but the bottom line is it's going to have to be something pretty extraordinary pretty statute say i did write the statute misdoubted right to stitch you counsel for the school were didn't write it we have to deal with what's written there but it does say that you know you can't modify or supplement unless it's against the manifest weight so this is the first  situation is obviously your schoolwork has determined that the hearing officers ultimate decision was against the manifest weight of the evidence and here's the evidence that the the hearing officer missed because that's really what annapolis way that yes i agree with you on the hypothetical but again you don't get to that you don't you don't you first have to look at what the hearing officer did and whether the hearing officers facts  facts they found the findings of fact in the terminations recommendations in me are supported by the evidence if they are oh you know you're that's the you're going to wind up you don't get to the second stage erroneous ok i mean that's it you'd have to find that the hearing officers decision was clearly erroneous when you consider those other hypothetical findings but i think that's but that's the second stage of review