School Board votes, ‘CHANGE’  teacher stays

A large crowd of people walked out of the Jackson County School Board office in Marianna disappointed by the board’s decision to uphold disciplinary actions against former Marianna Middle School teacher Greg Howard.
Many concerned citizens   spoke before the board at the meeting, calling for the termination of Howard’s employment.
Similar sentiments have been expressed to the school board and Superintendent Danny Sims since Howard explained to multiple seventh-grade classes two weeks ago that an acronym spelling out the word “change” included a racial expletive that begins with N.
Since the incident, Howard was placed on 10 days suspension without pay, removed from a football coaching position and transferred to a position at the Jackson County Adult Education program.
According to JCSB records, Howard began teaching at the Jackson County Adult Education program Thursday.
Howard, who has been a teacher for more than 20 years, was also required to write a letter of apology to the students that were involved, as well as attend diversity/sensitivity training.
Sims brought a recommendation before the board Thursday to stand by these disciplinary actions and not take any further action against Howard.
School board attorney Frank Bondurant explained to the board that, in the state of Florida, school boards are restricted from over-riding a superintendent’s recommendation with a more severe disciplinary action against on employee.
Bondurant said that the board could only oppose Sims’ recommendation with a less severe disciplinary plan.
If the board were to oppose Sims’ recommendation, Bondurant said, then Sims would have to place Howard back on a paid suspension until the matter was resolved.
After Bondurant’s explanation, the board voted 3 to 2, approving Sim’s recommendation.
Dr. Terry Nichols, Betty Duffee and Chris Johnson voted for the recommendation, while Charlotte Gardner and Kenny Griffin voted against it.
A number of people turned out for the school board meeting, including Tallahassee-based attorney Benjamin Crump, who was one of many who urged the board to terminate Howard’s employment.
After the meeting, Crump said he was surprised by the results.
“I actually was telling people not to worry, that surely they would have the sense to handle this correctly,” said Crump. “Now it will have to go into the court room.”
Rev. Riley Henderson also spoke before the board, and claimed that the racial slur incident was just one of many incidents in which Howard subjected his students to offensive remarks.
Cephus Granberry, a school district employee, spoke to the board as the father of a student in Howard’s class.
Granberry said his daughter was not present for the incident that made headlines, but was involved in another incident with Howard, in which the teacher allegedly called Granberry’s daughter and two other students idiots.
“Since then, every day she comes home and she is not the same,” said Granberry. “Not only has the ‘Change’ changed children but other statements that Mr. Howard has made has caused good children, good children, to change. It’s not right.”
Sims insisted that the school board performed a thorough investigation on Howard and found no history of this nature.
One citizen spoke on behalf of Howard, and that was James Howard.
“I’m not gonna take anybody to church and extemporary teaching isn’t my forte, but I’d just like to say that we’ve heard a lot of comments about the situation at hand. Many of the people have, I think, blown this way our of proportion,” said James Howard.
“I know Greg Howard.  I know him very well. And I understand from talking to him that he was trying to take a situation that was in his classroom and actually make a teaching moment out of that situation. He had the audacity to be a teacher ... This has been blown way out of proportion.”