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Education Screening

New Employee Screening Trend -Second Chance For Ex-Offenders

June 17, 2009 By Chris Miller

school_bus

There is a growing trend in employment screening that places more responsibility on employers to analyze a past criminal record to determine whether there is a business justification not to hire a person.

From The Columbus Dispatch:

Schools Could Hire Former Criminals

Custodians, bus drivers, secretaries and cafeteria workers could work in schools even with a past drug or theft conviction under a new rule being considered by the State Board of Education.

Committing a sex crime, kidnapping and murder still would prevent someone from working in a school. But some people who have committed nonviolent crimes — including robbery, cultivating marijuana or drug trafficking — could show they have been “rehabilitated” under the proposed rule.

The proposal would allow people with those less-serious convictions that occurred well in the past — ranging from five to 20 years, depending on the type of crime — work in a school if they can show evidence that they have walked the straight and narrow since. It would apply to new applicants and current employees.

Read the article here.

Related Posts From FYI Screening:

  • Background Checks For The Education Industry
  • The Importance of Employee Screening for Nonprofits
  • Top 4 Things You Need To Know About Employee Screening
  • 6 Background Screening Mistakes To Avoid

Photo Credits: krispdk

Filed Under: 2009 Best Employee Screening Posts, 2011 Best Employee Screening Posts, Best Practices For Employee Screening, Drug-Free Workplace, Employee Screening Trends, employment background checks, Legal Compliance, Nonprofits, Sex Offenders Tagged With: Drug Screening, Drug-Free Workplace, Education Background Checks, Education Screening, Nonprofits, Sex Offenders

Employee Screening Articles For October

October 31, 2008 By Chris Miller

In case you missed any of our employee screening articles for October, here’s a quick recap:

Sex Offenders and Halloween Safety Tips- Part 2

Sex Offenders and Halloween Safety Tips

Pre-Employment Drug Testing For Teachers

Background Checks For The Education Industry

Background Checks For Temporary Employees

Do You Have a Sex Offender Working For You?

Immigration Crackdown – HR Director Indicted

Drug-Free Work Week

Why Gaps In Employment Are A Red Flag

$100 Million For E-Verify

Hiring For Hotels: Why Screening Is Essential

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Filed Under: 2008 Best Employee Screening Posts, 2010 Best Employee Screening Posts, Background Checks, Best Practices For Employee Screening, Drug-Free Workplace, Employee Screening, Employee Screening Tips, employment background checks, Job Search, Negligent Hiring, Sex Offenders, Workplace Violence Tagged With: Background Check, Credit Report, Credit Reports, Drug Screening, Drug-Free Workplace, E-Verify, Education Background Checks, Education Screening, Employee Screening, Employee Theft, employment background checks, Form I-9, Gaps in Employment, Hotel Security, Immigration, Negligent Hiring, Negligent Hiring Lawsuits, Pre-Employment Screening, Sex Offender, Sex Offenders, Temp Workers, Vendor Background Checks, Workplace Violence

Background Checks For The Education Industry

October 27, 2008 By Chris Miller

One of tragic ironies of the education industry is that it often fails to properly screen teachers. For example, a study conducted in 2007 found that most Illinois teachers who were hired prior to 2004 were exempt from FBI background checks. These educators have a dangerous level of exposure to children. Consider that many of them could easily hide a criminal past.

Chilling Examples

Newspapers are filled with hundreds of cases in which educators are hired, but are unsuitable to have exposure to children. For example, a high school teacher named Jaime Katheryn Steen was recently jailed for distributing pornographic pictures to her students. George Tolbert, convicted of sexually abusing 2 children, served 4 years in jail, only to earn his teaching credentials and teach for 10 years. Chassappasi Rain, convicted of shooting 2 people in 1978, earned his teaching certificate in 1990 and found a teaching job in the Chicago Public School System.

Comprehensive background checks should have been performed on each of these people prior to hiring them as educators. By failing to screen them properly and allowing them into the classroom, school administrators are gambling with the safety of the students in their care.

Pre-Employment Screening For Educators

As the number of criminal cases involving teachers continues to escalate, state governments are starting to require pre-employment background checks. The problem is that the scope of these background checks is usually inadequate. They’re often limited to running an applicant’s name through an FBI database and doing a child abuse registry search. Not only is this approach plagued with problems (i.e. misspelled names, out of date profiles, etc.), but they often fail to uncover past criminal convictions.

School administrators need to implement more thorough pre-employment screening protocols. Even if funding seems to be a obstacle, it’s important to realize that properly screening teachers and conducting wide-ranging criminal background checks is relatively inexpensive. In fact, it can usually be done for less than what that teacher will earn during their first day on the job.

Limiting Risk And Protecting Students

Doing the bare minimum when screening educators is no longer a viable option. There is simply too much risk to the safety of the students. Allowing convicted felons to gain all-day access to children is a recipe for disaster. In fact, the education industry has been buffeted by high-profile incidents for years. It’s time for school administrators to take control by conducting extensive background checks on all personnel.

Subscribe to our blog to get more tips and articles on employee screening.

Related Posts:

The Importance of Employee Screening for Nonprofits

Do You Have a Sex Offender Working For You?

Top 4 Things You Need To Know About Employee Screening

Six Background Screening Mistakes To Avoid

Photo Credits: krispdk, aprilzosia

Filed Under: 2008 Best Employee Screening Posts, 2009 Best Employee Screening Posts, 2011 Best Employee Screening Posts, Background Checks, Employee Screening Tips, employment background checks, Job Search, Nonprofits, Sex Offenders Tagged With: Background Check, Background Checks, Criminal Background Checks, Education Background Checks, Education Screening, Employee Screening, Pre-Employment Screening, Sex Offender

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