Rev. Merrell removed from teacher sub list

By Tim Yovich

Ministers seeking a change in the fighting policy want to meet with the school board.

WARREN — The Rev. Alton Merrell, spokesman for a group of ministers trying to get the city school district to relax its zero-tolerance policy against fighting, has been taken off the district’s substitute- teacher list.

“I heard it through the grapevine. I heard it a few days ago,” said the Rev. Mr. Merrell, who was a city school teacher and principal for nearly 30 years.

Mr. Merrell has been the spokesman for ministers who believe the zero-tolerance policy should not be as firmly administered. They have said they want suspensions used, rather than expelling students.

On March 19, schools Superintendent Kathryn Hellweg and school board president Robert Faulkner had a memo issued saying that “we are not to work Alton Merrell in our district effective immediately as a substitute teacher.”

“They [the school administration] should have let me know,” Mr. Merrell said Thursday, noting he hadn’t received notice that his name was removed from the list.

Dawn Marzano, district director of communications, said Hellweg is not commenting on the issue.

Mr. Merrell, pastor of New Jerusalem Fellowship, explained that he began substituting three or four years ago to supplement his retirement income and because “I love working with children.”

He substituted three to five days a week, and the loss of income “is not going to kill me.”

The minister said no longer being a substitute should not overshadow the primary goals: getting a senior student with no record of violence, who was expelled for fighting, back into the classroom — and getting the policy changed.

The ministers had been attempting to get a meeting with Hellweg to discuss the issue. Eight ministers met with the superintendent Tuesday for about two hours, Mr. Merrell said, and they are attempting to schedule a meeting with the entire school board.

Last month, Hellweg called the police on the ministers when they attempted to have a press conference at the board’s Monroe Street offices.

Mr. Merrell explained that Hellweg told them that she was unaware the ministers wanted to hold the press conference before they arrived at the board offices.

“The board is the power,” Mr. Merrell said of wanting to meet with the entire board to press the ministers’ position that more discretion should be used in disciplining students for fighting.

yovich@vindy.com