Monday, September 22, 2008
STATE OF OHIO
Background checks
It wasn’t until 1993 that nonteaching school employees who had direct contact with pupils were required to undergo an Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation background check.
Under new laws enacted last year by state legislators, teachers and nonteaching employees — regardless of whether they interact with pupils — now must submit to the state-level review and to FBI background checks. For nonteaching employees, the checks will be performed when someone is hired and every five years after that.
Some criminal offenses require immediate dismissal, with no appeal, and others allow employees to keep their jobs if they can show they have been rehabilitated.
Among dismissable offenses: murder, perjury, rape, extortion, theft in office and kidnapping.
People convicted of crimes such as insurance fraud, domestic violence, assault, safe-cracking, arson and public indecency get the chance to prove they have been rehabilitated.
Source: The Plain Dealer