Kellerman Dismissal at PCHS to be Revisited
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[The Pinckneyville Community High School Board of Education has called a special meeting Monday, April 2 to discuss "appointment, employment, compensation, discipline, performance and/or dismissal of employees." The bulk of the meeting is likely to take place in executive session.
The board voted 4-3 not to rehire Social Studies teacher Nolan Kellerman at their regular meeting on March 26. All other tenured and non-tenured staff were retained for the coming year.
Nolan Kellerman is the brother of board member Nathan Kellerman.
There are potential problems with dismissing Kellerman in that he was in his fourth year of teaching at PCHS. All Illinois teachers hired after 1998 serve a four-year probationary period before earning tenure. The hiring authority for the district in which they work may dismiss any first, second or third-year teacher without giving cause by notifying them by certified mail 45 days before the end of the school year.
The last regular board meeting took place on Monday, March 26. At that meeting the board voted to amend the 2011-12 school calendar to end the Spring semester on May 7. The original end to the school year had been May 17.
Depending upon which date is used for the end of the school term, there may not have been enough time to notify Kellerman.
Fourth year teachers also must be given specific reasons as to why they were not re-hired.
According to 105 ILCS 5/24-11, the statue that governs contractual continued service for boards of education, teachers who have received evaluations of 'proficient' for four consecutive years will enter contractual continued service (tenure) with the district unless notified 45 days before the end of the school term.