Keeping kids safe

Friday, June 13, 2008 | 2:07 a.m.

In a legislative audit nearly two years ago, the Nevada Education Department was criticized for taking too long to revoke the licenses of teachers who had been convicted of crimes.

Things haven’t gotten much better.

On Saturday the State Board of Education will consider revoking the licenses of three teachers who have criminal convictions for child pornography. As Emily Richmond reported in Wednesday’s Las Vegas Sun, one of those men pleaded guilty 21 months ago. He and another man have already served their sentences, yet their licenses have not been revoked.

The department says the men’s licenses were “red flagged” after their arrests, meaning anyone who called to ask about them would be told to check their credentials. However, that is a far cry from pulling their licenses.

Over the past several years there have been too many cases of people who shouldn’t be in the classroom returning to teach because states haven’t taken the appropriate action against them.

For example, several years ago the Clark County School District hired a teacher from Utah who was later arrested and charged with having sex with a 15-year-old student. No one knew of previous allegations of inappropriate contact with girls against him in Utah, where school officials failed to take action against him.

Keith Rheault, the state superintendent of education, said one of the problems is that he doesn’t have the staff to track teachers who are facing disciplinary action. And with the state budget crisis, he doesn’t see that changing anytime soon.

However, when it comes to the safety of our children, the state budget shouldn’t be blamed. If Legislature’s Interim Finance Committee can’t find the money to pay for more people to track teacher disciplinary problems, the Education Department will have to find a way to track and quickly act to revoke criminals’ licenses.