Warning: rant ahead that does not take into account "guilty until proven innocent".

OK, I just have to vent about how absolutely sickened I am by this whole Urbana teacher sexual assault case. The "system" really seems to have failed the kids on so many levels and at so many points in time. It's already obvious I think that the Urbana district did not do any kind of background checking, or at least none beyond verifying employment of this man at previous schools. They appear to have totally missed as well that he was taking young girls into his room on a regular basis and also seem to have ignored parent's reports on things their kids said were going on. It's been said they have been aware since at least November, yet they allowed this man to continue teaching. As a parent, I don't give a damn if there is an investigation going on. If someone teaching our kids is accused of molestation or assault, get their asses out of the classroom until a conclusion is reached. I don't want them around my child in the meantime, if ever again.

This morning the News Gazette is reporting on some of the issues that came up surrounding this man in Normal before he came here. Turns out there were also multiple complaints filed there over the time he was employed, and in 2004 he was found with porn on a school computer and was suspended with pay. Then at the end of the 2004-05 school year he was also placed on paid administrative leave for making inappropriate remarks to a student. It also says that he taught at Brigham Elementary there, which is where my daughter would have been around the age of the kids he molested if we hadn't moved to the CU area. I can't tell you how absolutely sick to my stomach this makes me. How the hell do you put a teacher on MULTIPLE instances of leave for inappropriate conduct of some sort and NOT tell the next school system he's moving to? How is this not public record to begin with? This is gross failure on the part of all school systems involved, in my opinion.

I just don't understand how multiple school systems, at best, could not have communicated well enough to pass this information on when he came here. But I think, at this point, in my heart that I am certain that there was a massive failure on the part of many school officials in all of this that's going to become apparent and if that's the case, I'd personally really like to see some heads roll. These children (damn near babies) are going to have to live the rest of their lives with what this man has done and I for one blame not only the individual who actually committed the acts, but the system we put in place to "protect" our kids when we cannot be there to do so.

I just hope that there are some major changes coming to prevent this type of nightmare scenerio in the future on the part of the school systems, and I hope that the kids affected by this asshole can find some kind of peace in the future.