Bandon board: complaints now with lawyers as teachers and staff press for safety, staffing and clearer complaint procedures

The Bandon School Board told staff and community members that several formal personnel complaints and an unfair-labor-practice matter are now being handled by lawyers, and an executive session was scheduled to decide the next steps. Dozens of teachers, classified staff and aides used the public comment period to press the board for better safety supports, more staff and clearer, third-party complaint procedures.

Board remarks opening the meeting said the personnel dispute “is now in stage 5” and that mediation had been rejected, making arbitration the likely next step. The chair said the matters are “between lawyers at this point” and that the board would meet in executive session that night to determine how to proceed. He also emphasized the district is following policy and that emails or public comments are not formal complaints unless the required form is filed.

“There's nothing to do on our side,” the chair said, adding that the board received its first formal complaint on Nov. 17 and additional complaints on Dec. 5 and that newly submitted complaints would be handled in the established timeline.

Several speakers said they feel the district’s workplace culture has deteriorated and that staff worry about retaliation. One commenter described staff who once greeted each other now avoiding contact and said, “the backstabbing, the looking straight in your face, turning around and talking bad about you behind your back” is damaging morale.

Martha Lane, who spoke after the chair was introduced, urged adherence to due process and legal counsel. “We take any complaints, formal or otherwise, very seriously,” she said, adding that the board is not an investigative body and that procedures exist to protect due process. She framed administrative actions such as grade and attendance checks as student-safety and accountability measures, not retaliation.

In public comment, classroom and support staff detailed student-safety and staffing concerns. Maddie Ingram, a resource teacher, said elementary staff face daily incidents including hitting, kicking and biting and asked the board to consider alternative-education or safety-specific supports for students who need them. Carrie Twyman, a special-education assistant, described many students who fall through the cracks when supports are limited and called attendance a “huge thing.”

Blake Christiansen, a middle-school aide, said building-level staffing losses—he cited the loss of an English teacher and a librarian—have left some classes oversized and made behavior management more difficult. “You can't tell me that we're down more kids than that,” he said of staffing imbalances that, he and others argued, constrain instruction and safety.

Several staff questioned the use of state test results as a primary measure when many students opt out; one aide and an educational assistant said high-achieving students are often the first to opt out and that opt-outs can skew the picture classroom teachers see. A speaker who said 20-some teachers signed a letter urging action said those teachers had feared being targeted and asked for a third-party, anonymous process to probe complaints.

Elizabeth, who identified herself as president of the classified union, and other commenters said the problem is not only a teacher issue but affects classified staff and the broader community. Grant, a first-grade teacher, said beginning the meeting with remarks perceived as singling out particular schools or staff risked creating a divisive tone and could discourage honest dialogue.

The board said it has posted a formal complaint form on the district website and that when legal counsel is involved communications are limited to lawyer-to-lawyer contacts. The chair said transparency remains a priority but that legal constraints sometimes curtail public discussion of specific personnel matters.

The board planned an executive session that night to discuss how to proceed; no public action was taken in the meeting to resolve the personnel matters. The board and multiple speakers closed by urging a return to focus on students and a healthier, more unified working culture.