By Emily Richmond (contact)

Tue, Dec 2, 2008 (2 a.m.)

For years, Nevada’s education officials have waited until teachers accused of wrongdoing were convicted before suspending or revoking their licenses.

It now appears that the Nevada Education Department had the authority to take immediate action all along, but didn’t know it.

A statute on the books since 1967 allows public agencies to immediately suspend any license, pending formal proceedings, when the “public health, safety or welfare imperatively require emergency action.”

Keith Rheault, Nevada’s superintendent of public instruction, said Monday that he believes the statute covers the Education Department, which licenses and monitors the state’s teachers and school administrators.

Individual districts have more leeway to place an employee on administrative leave when allegations of misconduct surface. But unless a local district reports an employee to the state or the state learns of allegations through other channels, a teacher could conceivably keep his license and get a job elsewhere.

The board’s newly discovered authority came into play in the cases of four teachers whose licenses are up for revocation on Saturday. Rheault used the statute to order the immediate suspension of the teachers, pending a hearing. The four cases involve allegations of child pornography or inappropriate contact with a minor.

A fifth case coming before the board involves a teacher convicted of drug-related charges.

For now, Rheault said he plans to limit emergency suspensions to cases directly involving allegations of sex-related offenses and crimes involving children.

“We’re not going to abuse our authority,” Rheault said.

The authority came to light this fall as Rheault worked on a bill draft request for the 2009 legislative session. The proposed bill would have given the state’s superintendent authority to suspend a license immediately after the individual was charged with a crime.

Rheault said the Legislative Counsel Bureau told him there appeared to be a statute on the books that would serve the same purpose. The statute was used to suspend the licenses of health practitioners connected to endoscopy centers that violated medical safety protocols.

“Doctors can be suspended immediately for the safety of the public,” Rheault said. “I didn’t see these teachers as any different.”

Rheault was frustrated that it took so long for the statute to come onto his radar. The long delays between a teacher’s arrest and the resolution of the legal case have been a source of tension between the Education Department and the public, Rheault said.

In addition to law enforcement records and information from school districts, the Nevada Education Department relies on a database maintained by the National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification to check the backgrounds of teachers. The database collects records of licenses, suspensions and revocations from all 50 states, U.S. territories, New Zealand and several Canadian provinces, according to the organization’s Web site.

“Now when we do the suspension we can report directly to the national database, so the information is up there immediately,” Rheault said. “That’s always been a big concern, that someone could skip town and go to another state.”

Terri Miller, president of Stop Educator Sexual Abuse, Misconduct & Exploitation, or SESAME, said she’s long argued that Nevada school officials don’t make full use of the laws already on the books to punish teachers and protect students.

“They would rather cover up what happens in our schools and save face,” Miller said.

If Rheault really wants to crack down on teachers who abuse students, Miller said, he should support an independent reporting system that allows victims to file complaints directly with the state.

The teachers whose licenses are up for revocation on Saturday are:

• Don K. Smith, a Clark County School District teacher who most recently taught at Tate Elementary School. In December 2007 he pleaded guilty to attempted lewdness with a child younger than 14, according to court documents. He received a suspended prison sentence and four years’ probation. The district has placed him on leave.

• Michael Gogerty, who is serving eight years in a federal prison for receiving child pornography. Federal agents found hundreds of CDs containing child pornography at the home of the Pahrump elementary school teacher. Although the Nye County School District immediately suspended Gogerty following his arrest in August 2007, the Nevada Education Department took no formal action until September.

• Kevin Kegel, a Lyon County teacher who pleaded guilty in December 2007 to felony “sexual conduct with a pupil age 16 or 17 from the same school,” according to court documents. Kegel was given a suspended prison term, required to spend 46 consecutive weekends in jail and complete mental health treatment.

• Kimberly Tamburello, a Lyon County teacher since 2001. In November 2007, she pleaded guilty to trafficking a controlled substance, and received a suspended prison sentence, according to court documents. She most recently worked as a substitute teacher.

• Also on the revocation list is Robert Jensen of Mukilteo, Wash. Jensen was granted a Nevada teaching license in 2006 but never worked in a Nevada district. He was convicted in Washington of attempted possession of child pornography, and his name was added to a database shared by the nation’s state education departments.

Twice a month, the name of every individual holding a Nevada teaching license, as well as pending applicants, is run through the national database. That’s how Jensen’s file was flagged, Rheault said. It’s an example of how the safety net can work, Rheault said.

“We are doing due diligence,” Rheault said. “We all want our children to be safe.”