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[quote=Anonymous]Disclaimer: By no means am I seeking legal action against the PGCPS or the school I was serving. That idea went out the window when I resigned instead of letting them fire me. All I'm seeking is a way to clear my name of wrong doing.

I'm not a teacher, but served as a HS coach in the county since 2002(5 years as an assistant, 10 as HC all at the same school).
So last school year there was an incident in which I removed several members of the team. After speaking to their parents and then removing them from the team I informed my Athletic Director what happened. A few days later I found out that one of the student athletes parents wasn't satisfied with her child's removal and based on some info from her child she informed the administration of another incident in which drugs were involved and the parent the complained why I didn't removed others from the team as well. I didn't know anything about any drug usage or consumption. When the kids gave their statement to the administration, it was told I knew nothing about it and that the drugs were purchased and mostly consumed at a private residence. Ironically the parent who made the call didn't have the full story from her child,  not only was the child the one who purchased the illegal substance, but it was mostly consumed during a sleepover at the parent's house with her having no knowledge of it. Unfortunately from what I learned the rest of it was consumed during an out of town competition which started the next day and ran for a period of 3 days.

Anyway, based on the information the principal suspended me and accused me of failure to report an incident, despite the fact that I did reported what I knew to my Athletic Director, which was a situation in which team rules and team curfew were violated.  I knew nothing about the drug consumption of my athletes.  The principal framed a false narrative and told his bosses a different scenario about the situation and my role. Some say he was protecting himself and needed a scapegoat.  However with all the evidence and information, others said it was all unnecessary and there was no need for a suspension.

So I was put on administrative leave. During the summer I contacted the school's administration multiple times to find out if there was any movement in my case. Around August, I was finally told by the Principal that the county would not hear my case and instructed him to find another coach. I'm not sure if it was because I'm just a coach in the county and not a full time teacher or something else. It was quite clear that I was not going to get due process and will not be allowed to state my case that I did nothing wrong. The one thing that kinda burns me up, before I was suspended he knew that I reported the initial incident to my AD, he even admitted it to me during this conversation.  My question, if you knew and you had all the evidence about what happened including the statements from the team members regarding the drug consumption that totally cleared me, why was I still put on Administrative leave?   So anyway, the principal gave me some names to contact which included an AC, the County Athletic Director, another person who just so happened to be a friend of my mom(a retired PGCPS teacher) and a few other people in an effort to gain an audience. I contacted all of them either by email or phone(left messages) and didn't hear back from anyone. After a week of nothing along with the knowledge that the school under the command of the county Athletic department was actively looking to replace me, I resigned.  Some said I should have let the county fire me so that I can take legal action against the county and make a wrongful termination complaint.

I have had a few months to process this, I'm still very angry with the Principal because of the lying and the County for sticking their heads in the sand.  I'm thinking it probably didn't matter too much to them because at the end of the day I was only an athletic coach, pretty much making me expendable.

Like I said in the disclaimer, I'm not seeking legal action against the county.  Right now all I want is my name cleared of any wrong doing, I'm not sure how to do it. If I wanted to come back to coach again in the county, I don't think I can with this still hanging over my head.

What can I do or am I just SOL?[/quote]

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