Court Opinion

ID: 9602219
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:52:32.711686+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:01.527096
License: Public Domain

STERNBERG, Judge,
specially concurring.
I am in complete agreement with the disposition of the jurisdictional issue by the majority, and agree with the result reached by the majority in affirming the action of the Board in placing the teacher on probation. However, my emphasis on that portion of the opinion differs.
Among the teacher tenure panel’s findings are these: the teacher failed to cooperate with his team teachers and with an advisor; he yanked the hair of a student, swatted a female student on the bottom, and swore at and threatened the principal. These are findings of basic or evidentiary fact and as such may be used by the Board even though it does not accept the panel’s conclusions on matters of ultimate fact. Blair v. Lovett, supra. These findings of evidentiary fact would have justified the Board on terminating the teacher; thus, the Board’s act of grace in placing the teacher on probation instead was a valid exercise of its discretion under the statute.