The deadline for employees of the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County school system to sign a release authorizing the system to run a criminal-records check on them has been extended to Dec. 14.
In October, Ralph David Surridge, 57, a teacher at Mineral Springs Middle School, was charged with 10 counts of felony sexual misconduct and with possession of firearms by a felon. When law-enforcement officers investigated the reports of Surridge's sexual misconduct, they turned up a 1985 conviction for embezzlement that the school system's pre-employment background check had missed
The Surridge incident prompted the school- system decision to spend $30,000 to check the criminal records of all 8,000 employees and 1,000 substitutes to see whether anything else turns up.
At the Nov. 10 meeting of the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Board of Education, school officials said that they planned to send out release forms by this past Monday, with the requirement that everyone sign the releases by Dec. 7.
Yesterday, Superintendent Don Martin sent an e-mail to school employees saying that it would be a few more days before releases are ready, and that the deadline would be extended until Dec. 14.
Up until then, employees also have a grace period to report any previously unreported criminal charges and convictions. As Martin put it in the e-mail: "If you have failed to notify us in the past, you may do so prior to December 14th without any negative repercussions from not reporting. If however, you have been convicted of a crime, there may be negative consequences."
In an effort to come up with a release that is agreeable to everyone, school officials have been working with, among others, Tripp Jeffers, the president of the Forsyth County Association of Educators. Jeffers said that he and others wanted to make sure that the release didn't include information that is not pertinent, such as credit history and workers-compensation claims.
"This is about looking for felonies," he said.
The release that employees will be asked to sign is a reasonable one, he said. "On our part, we are going to encourage everybody to sign it."
As of yesterday, school officials had not decided what the consequences would be for employees who don't sign. Theo Helm, a spokesman for the school system, said he doesn't expect that refusal to sign the release will be a problem.
"We anticipate everybody signing it," Helm said.
Jeffers concurred.
"I feel confident that the school system is going to be treating everybody fairly," he said.
Martin has suspended Surridge without pay and recommended that the school board dismiss him. The board could vote to do that at its next regular meeting on Tuesday.
kunderwood@wsjournal.com
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