Lindbergh Middle School principal Julie McArdle was fired tonight at a special meeting of the District 150 Board of Education. The story is on WEEK’s site, and more details are on Billy’s blog.
Since it’s a personnel matter, the District is not talking. However, McArdle’s lawyer, Richard Steagall, is saying the principal is actually a whistleblower who uncovered a number of different improprieties by someone in central administration. A lawsuit will be filed against the District.
This story is bound to get bigger.
UPDATE: The Journal Star’s story is up now. Note:
The action [firing McArdle] occurred about six months after McArdle is said to have first blown the whistle on the previous Lindbergh principal….
Police and other sources confirmed that the investigation centers around McArdle’s allegation that her predecessor as Lindbergh principal, Mary Davis, misused district money in 2007-08….
[McArdle’s attorney, Richard] Steagall said McArdle informed district administrators about the credit card after receiving a phone call from a credit card company on Oct. 26 regarding late payments on the balance due. Previously unaware of a school credit card, McArdle asked for statements to be sent to the school.
According to Steagall, the balance on the card had at one point climbed beyond $9,000. He said McArdle also found documentation that $4,002.05 was paid toward the balance of the credit card from student activities funds on June 30, with that amount received by the credit card company on July 4.
“She found out there was a credit card for Lindbergh School with $9,000 in charges on it,” Steagall said of his client. “There were charges for Peoria Toyota, FedEx/Kinko’s, Amazon.com, Best Buy, an American Girls doll store, cash advances, things like that. One payment for over $4,000 was from the student activity fund. She’s reported all of this.”
After bringing the suspicious financial information to the district’s attention in October, McArdle assumed the district was investigating and didn’t pursue if further, Steagall said.
But recently, McArdle was asked by the district to resign, Steagall said. He believes that was directly in relation to McArdle’s whistle-blowing.
What’s interesting is reading the comments on WEEK’s and the Journal Star’s sites. If each commenter is really a different person, it would seem that there is no small amount of animosity toward McArdle. Yet other sources tell me McArdle is innocent and is being punished for blowing the whistle. Hopefully the police investigation will get to the bottom of the matter.
However it turns out, it’s another black eye for District 150.
http://centralillinoisproud.com/content/video/?watch=1&cid=56431
If you are not a Lindbergh Middle School staff member, student or parent you do not know the entire story! Please think before you write!
I don’t see how being a parent, staff member, or student makes you any more informed on the issue of the credit card misuse than any of the rest of us. I certainly wouldn’t hold anything a student says against a principal as something golden—especially after reading posts shown as being from the students. Most of them weren’t even coherent.
Paaaaallllleeeeeeeeeeeaaaaase teachingrocks
As a teacher, I assume by your name, students are not always coherent. Especially in this day and age. Oh, but, I am sure, ALL of your students would write a perfect blog entry!!!
Let’s get real, credit card misuse is not why McArdle was fired. She was also not fired for being a “whistle blower”. The attorneys would be, hopefully, smarter than that.
Think about WHY a board of education, with legal advise, would terminate a principal.
If you are not a parent, staff member or student of Lindbergh Middle School YOU really have no idea of what the story REALLY is!
I am not claiming to know the “real” story. I’m just stating the parents, staff members, and (especially) the students don’t know the real story either.
I also think it’s sad that somehow it’s okay “in this day and age” that our students are no longer held accountable for writing coherently.
“The attorneys would be, hopefully, smarter than that.” LMAO! You must not be familiar with David Walvord.
sharon, the law is clear that if she was fired for whistleblowing, it was a “retaliatory discharge” which is, if you car about such things, of course, illegal. When I said prove, I meant that proof of her allegations would likely get her a very big judgment. Yes, Relle, that former Superintendent might well have been given a “nuisance settlement,” but I doubt it was much. Think about it, if a civil plaintiff doesn’t want to give a deposition, there’s a reason.
New article on pjstar….. they just put it up saying a review was done earlier and there were no discrepancies found in accounting at Lindbergh, though the charge card was going to Mary Davis’s home address.
“When allegations initially surfaced Friday, auditors went to the school to get the documents showing the financial details. None were found. District 150 on Friday filed a report with Peoria police regarding the allegations of misappropriation as well as theft of the documents.
Police officials on Tuesday said it was unclear why the reports were withheld not put in the “media file” along with other police reports until Monday, nearly three days later.
District 150 attorney David Walvoord said a financial review of the middle school, including its activity fund, by Clifton Gunderson LLC, the district’s auditors, received a “clean bill of health” last year, when Davis, now an academic officer in the school district’s central administration office, was a principal there.” pjstar
Who is responsible for placing documents in the “media file” and why did it take them 3 days to do it?
Read the whole article, then the complaint. Then go take a shower.
OMG I just read the entire complaint…. why are those 3 people still employed with District 150? Can’t the state come in and remove them? Ken Hinton purposely covered for Mary Davis by reporting the amount as $300!!!!!
I am sooooooo happy she is suing Broderick too!
Say it with me…
The District office and the School Board must be removed.
The District office and the School Board must be removed.
The District office and the School Board must be removed!
I just read the PJS article and the complaint. How can District 150 say that no credit card was issued to Lindbergh or in the name of Mary Davis (together with Davis’ statement that she had had one but closed it), yet Discover seems to have a record of such a card “carrying the name Lindbergh Middle School…addressed to Mary Davis’ home address” still open in January 2009)—and credit card statements that were sent to McArdle upon her request? What am I missing here? 150 simply can’t be involved in a bold-faced lie–or can they? I am still not clear about the $4,000 paid from the Lindbergh Activity. That payment to Discover seems to indicate that the credit card might have been a personal card, but why would Lindbergh’s name be on the card. Someone’s got some “splaining” to do.
Sharon, I think you can get a credit card with about any business name on it. But, if she did it without Admin approval, why does she still have a job? If she did it with Admin approval, why does Hinton still have a job? Honestly, why do either of them still have a job?
McArdle aside, I would like to know what the ramifications are for not honoring the “no child left behind” law? That in and of itself is astounding. Can’t they be slapped with a lawsuit for that alone?
20-some comments later and the story remains unclear, yet the same cast of magpies is still clamoring for blood. Replete with pitchforks and torches, the unknowing mob’s blind rage will now crescendo at the District’s office, sated by nothing less than the removal of the entire District office and Board.
This emblematizes a lot of what is wrong with District/parent/teacher relations. Wake up, you’re not in high school anymore.
nontimendum, You are exactly right! We are not in high school any more. We are in the real world all grown up and yet, there are still monsters! Monsters that want to shorten our children’s education, monsters that show favoritism and monsters that go into a rage and throw spoiled fits. Monsters that twist their words and monsters that lie! Monsters that run their business through fear and intimidation! Monsters that twist things to fit their own personal needs, including controlling the population of a school so they do not have to deal with “no child left behind.” With this district, it never ends! And I’m sorry the entire scenario is still unclear to you, you don’t look that dumb, which part don’t you get?
For those of us that have witnessed this monster in action, we can only pray this is the end.
“727th (of 855 districts)”
http://www.schooldigger.com/go/IL/district/31230/search.aspx
The District website is STILL down…
I also find it interesting that I can’t find any photos online of the District Administration except for Hinton… and Cahill.
Wouldn’t it be nice if our issues were as simple as they were when Alicia Butler was still here? Just a lousy “lying on a resume” charge.
And the monster devours all the money it can get its claws on…
20-some comments later and the story remains unclear, yet the same cast of magpies is still clamoring for blood. Replete with pitchforks and torches, the unknowing mob’s blind rage will now crescendo at the District’s office, sated by nothing less than the removal of the entire District office and Board.
This emblematizes a lot of what is wrong with District/parent/teacher relations. Wake up, you’re not in high school anymore.
Nontimendum – You have a valid point. None of these claims have been proven. However, you would surely agree that there is certainly enough information to determine that McCardles firing was at best, premature.
The frustration on our part, as parents and taxpayers, is that once again this B of E has blindly gone where they shouldn’t go, prematurely, without clearness of thought, obviously following bad advice, and not exhibiting one molecule of a backbone in protecting district assets and integrity. These are the SAME people that have just closed our schools because of an alleged “lack of funding” and intend to “restructure” our entire district – despite the fact that they can’t manage even a simple personell issue.
So it goes more money in an already tenuos situation is sucked out of the district – away from the children, while at least two property tax increases and possibly a third are looming on the horizon..
Can this picture get any worse? And where are our civic leaders?
kcdad: Were you also talking about the Federal Reserve, World Bank, IMF, …. other siblings and cousins of the Federal Reserve ……..
KARRIE: Bureaucracy… it goes by many names, none of which are humanity.
I wonder if there was more “pocketed cash” and improper use of school credit cards?
Curious…Why is it the “whistleblower” who tries to right a wrong always is the one who gets fired? Workplace bullying is illegal in most states….and the UNION is powerless. I’d hire an employment attorney to investigate all records in the school district.
No wonder…..nobody speaks up for heaven’s sake!
Status quo… gotta protect it… why? Qui Bono?
As Mel Brooks in Blazing Saddles says: “Men, we need to protect our phony baloney jobs! Harumph Harumph…”
MsCommonSense: Administrators aren’t protected by the union. I hope those who do not favor unions can understand how lack of protection would prevent teachers from speaking out on such matters as these–and it is often teachers who have a sense of improprieties with money or any other issues within a particular school. Even with union protection, teachers have reason to fear retaliation of one kind or another. I don’t know if teachers still get $100 or $200 credit cards for supplies. I don’t know of any or many teachers who do not spend that much or more on supplies out of their own pockets–so not much danger of that money being misused. Dr. Royster, I believe, started this practice (it may be gone now) but we were restricted to a very few places to spend our money: Barnes and Noble, Office Deport, Office Max, etc.
Responding to Red Flag under a different posting: Perhaps some insight into District 150’s thought process. When Elaine Hopkins had written an article about Cahill’s financial indiscretions, one board member stated she was on a “witch hunt.” Two weeks or so later (out of the blue), Cahill was removed. Sometimes it just takes a while for the truth to sink in or possibly for the wind to blow in a different direction.