The accusations came from students, teachers, parents and possibly even anonymous sources.
Sixty-nine Anne Arundel County public school employees were reported for possible sexual or physical abuse of students in the 2023-24 school year.
Ten of those complaints were credible enough for Maryland Child Protective Services and police to investigate.
If you’ve never heard these numbers before, you’re not alone.
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No Maryland school district publicly reports data on staff investigations, a vast difference from student conduct data published yearly.
That lack of transparency has long-lasting effects, and a jury verdict in Annapolis last week shows why.
One of those Anne Arundel teachers accused in the 2023-24 school year was Matthew Schlegel.
When a teacher charged with sexually abusing students is found not guilty, the pain won’t go away quickly. Not for the teacher, the students, their families nor the community.
Schlegel — arrested, jailed, indicted, tried and acquitted of felony abuse charges — faces a life sentence of public doubt.
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The Severna Park Elementary students who accused him, their families and advocates must cope not only with a sense of justice denied — regardless of the outcome of misdemeanors the jury couldn’t settle — but also the skepticism raised by a high-profile acquittal.
And the Maryland public, confronted anew with the reality that teachers reflect the human condition and all its flaws, is once more left wondering if trust in schools is justified.
More transparency is perhaps the best shot at a remedy.
The process of investigating teacher conduct is not widely understood. Individual allegations and internal outcomes aren’t made public to avoid tarring someone unfairly, particularly when it involves teachers and students.
Usually, the public learns about them only through headlines and mugshots. There is evidence that abuse charges against teachers are rising, but no concrete numbers.
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What’s causing that, and whether it’s true for Maryland, is unclear. It could be a result of modern Americans living life online.
There are no state or federal rules requiring schools to report the number of allegations against teachers or investigation results.
Anne Arundel County gathered a summary in response to a public information request, though it left some questions unanswered.
“AACPS does not have readily available information regarding which investigations resulted in disciplinary actions or criminal charges,” schools spokesperson Bob Mosier wrote in an email. “To determine whether an investigation resulted in a disciplinary action, each individual file would need to be reviewed to make that determination.”
Although no names were included in its response, one of the 69 cases from 2023-24 involved Schlegel. A student went to a school official, and seven more eventually came forward.
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Arrested at his home by police — with a television news crew present — and held without bail for more than a year, Schlegel maintained his innocence. The only witnesses were eight students who said he touched them inappropriately in class.
Some were deemed too fragile to testify. Those who did, however, didn’t convince the jury of Schlegel’s guilt. The jury cleared him of all counts except three misdemeanor assault charges.
He was released from custody and faces a hearing next week on those charges. If they are retried, Schlegel would remain in limbo.
If Circuit Judge Pamela K. Alban dismisses them, the 45-year-old teacher would be free to seek a return to work.
What happens when the verdict is not guilty will always be difficult for the public to see, hidden behind the balance of public accountability, fair employment protections and student privacy.
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“AACPS does not take disciplinary action on an administrative case until the criminal case, if there is one, has been adjudicated,” Mosier wrote. “As such, our investigations do not result in criminal charges.”
The 69 alleged abuse cases in 2023-24 equaled the number in the 2022-23 academic year, and were just one more than in the previous year.
A small number were turned over to Child Protective Services and police — 10 in 2023-24, seven in 2022-23 and 11 in 2021-22.
Police announced charges against three teachers in those three years. Schlegel was the only one acquitted.
Although the school system’s Office of Investigation wouldn’t look for criminal conduct by Schlegel, it would report any it discovered. Instead, it would examine possible misconduct as defined by the employee handbook.
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Investigators would make a recommendation to Superintendent Mark Bedell, who could restore Shlegel’s status, discipline him or fire him. That would likely result in having his name added to the state’s list of teachers whose licenses have been revoked.
Of the more than 300 on the current list, the vast majority are teachers tied to allegations of misconduct with students.
A similar process plays out for all complaints, about 80 each year. Of those, 14 to 17 involved alleged discrimination or harassment by school employees.
Still more were initiated under the self-reporting rule adopted in 2010. It requires employees to report criminal charges against them outside of school.
Schlegel’s fate could follow the path of Chuck Yocum, a county schools teacher charged with sexually abusing a student in the 1990s.
After he was acquitted, his attorneys negotiated his return to work, if not the classroom. Yocum worked in administrative roles until he retired last summer.
That would have been the end of it had he not run for the county Board of Education.
An investigation by The Baltimore Banner revealed the student who accused him of abuse not only stood by her allegations but felt betrayed that the settlement allowed him to run for the board. Yocum lost the election.
Schlegel could seek a return to teaching, but that seems unlikely given the high-profile nature of his trial. He could decide to leave teaching or start over elsewhere.
Whatever the public learns is likely to come from lawsuits, the list of revoked licenses and, worst of all, gossip — indirect sources that breed distrust.
Schools across Maryland should do more to ensure confidence so that the next time a teacher faces allegations, everyone understands the context.
They can start with transparency.
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