You don’t have to live in Arkansas to know how important Razorback football is to our culture here. The University of Arkansas turns out a steady stream of athletic success stories, as well as leaders in state and national politics. The Razorback nation is a vast, powerful network — with its famous figureheads keeping the public eye focused away from the rotten corruption of its underbelly.
Dr. Omon Fitzgerald Hill served as a coach for the Razorbacks from 1989–2000, before he became President of Arkansas Baptist College, a pastor, and a member of the State Board of Education appointed by Governor Asa Hutchinson (a University of Arkansas law school graduate, himself.)
When Fitz Hill speaks, all of Arkansas listens.
Thus, in 2007, when Dr. Hill recommended a former Razorback offensive lineman, Isaac Davis, for a job teaching special education (SPED) in the Little Rock School District (LRSD,) Davis’ application was promptly accepted.
Hiring Isaac Davis on a provisional SPED license (with no education degree) to work with disabled students threw fuel on the underground fire of corruption in our capital city. Despite powerbrokers’ concerted efforts to smother the flames, the smoke still lingers in every breath we take.
In 2010, then-principal Marvin Burton (currently Deputy Superintendent, slated to become principal of the new Southwest high school) suspended Davis without pay for “the use of profanity against a student” and “physically grabbing a student by the face.” Even though LRSD explicitly forbids corporal punishment, Isaac Davis was allowed to grab a student by the face without losing anything more than a day’s pay.
In 2014, Davis transferred to Henderson Middle School (HMS.) Within a few months, HMS Principal Frank Williams issued a written reprimand against Davis for (again) abusing his role as an authority figure by using profanity against a student. In March, 2015, Williams suspended Davis without pay for continued use of profanity against students.
Maybe Frank Williams should have kept a “swear jar” in the Henderson SPED classroom. Clearly, “progressive discipline” wasn’t helping Isaac Davis improve his teaching skills. At least with a “swear jar” approach, LRSD could have helped alleviate some of its chronic financial problems!
Isaac Davis is Frank Williams’ fraternity brother in Phi Beta Sigma. It is widely acknowledged that Greek fraternities and sororities represent self-protecting factions within LRSD. As a UniServ Director for the Arkansas Education Association (AEA) suggested to Superintendent Baker Kurrus a few months later, it appears that Frank Williams was falsifying documents to protect his fraternity brother, Isaac Davis.
Despite the official administrative position that inappropriate language was Davis’ only problematic classroom behavior, Davis’ students finally made themselves heard. First, two boys approached James Hemphill to report that Davis had ordered a boy to push another student. Hemphill did not document or investigate this exchange, but the kids kept trying. On May 13, 2015, three students from Classroom 45 reported, to behavioral interventionist Mr. Ryan Gore, what was really happening behind that “self-contained” classroom’s closed door.
According to these students (corroborated by a cell phone video that Frank Williams had been attempting to suppress since the past November and a report from the teacher whose classroom shared a wall with Classroom 45) Isaac Davis was ordering certain students to block the exit while he compelled the kids to fight each other — on a daily basis.
Remember, these were students with special needs. Davis was a SPED teacher. Not only was Davis verbally abusing his students, he was forcing them to fight each other like adolescent gladiators. Students also reported that Davis had lifted one of them, bodily, and “slammed” him to the floor — resulting in documented bruises and trauma.
Mr. Gore was a mandated reporter of suspected child maltreatment. However, Frank Williams expected teachers to report suspected abuse to him first, prior to contacting the DHS hotline. So, Mr. Gore emailed Principal Williams on May 15, 2015, “There are a series of events that have apparently been taking place, and as a mandated reporter, I am fulfilling my duty to first report this to you…”
Tina Miller, another HMS teacher who was a mandated reporter, had already gone through this process four times. She filed her first DHS report in October, 2014. Each time, she included Frank Williams on the report. Each time, DHS failed to act, and Davis was allowed to continue his abusive behavior.
Fortunately, Mr. Gore also contacted the children’s parents. Tasha Baker arrived at Henderson to meet — alongside the families of other abused special needs students— with Frank Williams on May 20, 2015. Her impassioned words on behalf of her son, Davontay Baker, echo the pain that every mother feels when her child is being harmed:
“My son could be charged for hurting this student, but he was told to do it by an authority [Isaac Davis.] That’s confusing to him and these kids are in behavior classes. So you know that means that something is wrong.
So this authority, this teacher [Isaac Davis] is manipulating them and playing with them. And he got them fighting and that’s not right.
How long have [Isaac Davis] been doing this before we found out about it? And then if he stay here, how long is it gonna go after my son leaves this school? That’s where I got the problem in. These kids don’t deserve that and there needs to be something done. And that’s all I’m saying. And it’s not right.
And [Isaac Davis is] walking around like he’s a bully, like he’s tough. He kept walking past us looking at us crazy like he’s gonna intimidate us.You’re not. I’m gonna stand firm of what I said and what I mean because this is my baby. He my baby. And I want nobody hurting my baby. And that’s what this man have done today.
You keep your hands to yourself because if we touch you we’re going to jail. If I touch my own baby I’m going to jail. What gives this man the right to do it? No, he shouldn’t have that right. That’s all I’m saying and there needs to be something done.
He already — this is not the first student though. He assaulted that little boy. It’s on tape. The momma got it on the phone. She just showed it to us right out there. Where he assaulted that little boy. But I already knew he did it without even seeing it.”
— For the full audio recording of this meeting, click here.
This meeting was a fork in the road for Frank Williams, LRSD, Superintendent Baker Kurrus, Education Commissioner Johnny Key, DHS, the Little Rock Police Department, the AEA, and Governor Asa Hutchinson. They could have chosen to walk toward justice for children and families. Instead, they chose to run away from their responsibilities by firing Mr. Gore and (according to the families, Mr. Gore, and multiple attorneys) bribing witnesses, threatening parents, and ultimately trying a disabled child as an adult, and prosecuting him for murder in order to make the district’s problems go away.
Why did Little Rock excuse this child abuse? It comes down to money and politics.
Governor Asa Hutchinson’s Department of Education (ADE) had just removed the LRSD school board, and was in direct control of the district. His new appointee, Education Commissioner Johnny Key, had only been in office for two months when these students reported their abuse. Although Key could have spun this story as state takeover uncovering deep rot, Hutchinson and Key chose a neglectful approach. Allowing LRSD to disintegrate under total mismanagement provides the platform for Hutchinson and Key to push their privatization/deregulation agenda. Too bad the voters of Little Rock didn’t know about this when Asa Hutchinson ran for re-election last year!
Johnny Key appointed Baker Kurrus as superintendent(replacing Dexter Suggs) three days after Davontay and two other students made their report to Mr. Gore. In addition to Mr. Gore’s report, HMS teacher Tina Miller sent her own email about abuse at Henderson directly to Kurrus on his fourth day on the job. At that point, nobody knew what kind of superintendent Kurrus would be — but Ms. Miller’s report proves Kurrus was informed of the abuse immediately, and did not step in.
Under Baker Kurrus’ watch, abused children had to stay in their abuser’s classroom for another year — or go on to high school having learned absolutely nothing at Henderson except how to fight. These children were incredibly harmed. This has never even been acknowledged.
As Gore’s termination process went forward, though, AEA UniServ directors had started documenting differences between the way Kurrus managed cases involving “black” schools and “white” schools.Henderson is a “black” school. By the time that Kurrus was deliberately lying to the AEA about whether or not he had already written a letter of termination to Ryan Gore, it was too late for him to change course. Transparency might have hurt his 2018 mayoral campaign and impeded his appointment to Mayor Frank Scott, Jr.’s transition team last December.
Dr. Fitz Hill, mired in allegations of financial wrongdoing at Arkansas Baptist College, was listed as a character reference on Isaac Davis’ employment application for LRSD. Dr. Hill also serves on the board of the charterizing special interest group: Arkansas Public School Resource Center (APSRC,) with Jim Walton, Jim Hendren, Randy Zook (husband of SBoE member Diane Zook.) Just after Baker Kurrus and the LREA allowed Isaac Davis to resign from LRSD with dignity, and just before Ryan Gore’s final termination hearing, Asa Hutchinson appointed Dr. Hill joined the State Board of Education. The next year, Dr. Hill directed the creation of the LRSD Athletic Foundation, where he serves as President and CEO. How can Dr. Hill call himself a caretaker of public education for all children if he enables abusers and mismanages public money?
The Arkansas Education Association (and its Little Rock local, the LREA) represents educators’ due process rights in disciplinary proceedings. Tim Greene, of the AEA, negotiated on Isaac Davis’ behalf after Kurrus tried to fire him. The LREA and LRSD agreed to allow Isaac Davis to take unpaid FMLA leave (giving him continuing health insurance coverage, but no salary) until May 31, 2016 — instead of going through the process of terminating Davis “for cause.”
Any scandal related to child abuse by Isaac Davis or the misuse of Family and Medical Leave would reflect poorly on the teachers’ union and its continued lobbying efforts at the state and federal level. Moreover, a scandal might have impeded then-LREA president Cathy Koehler in her AEA presidential campaigns both currently and in 2017.
Principal Frank Williams was a former housemate of LRSD Director of Student Services, Freddie Fields. Multiple sources suggest that — in addition to Williams being a womanizer — Williams was Fields’ lover.
I queried Frank Williams about his relationship with Freddie Fields, but Mr. Williams declined to answer.
As Superintendent Dexter Suggs admitted (and apologized for,)Freddie Fields assisted LRSD school board members Leslie Fisken and Melanie Fox (currently a member of the LRSD Community advisory Board) in their efforts to undermine Clarke Tucker in his 2014 race against Stacy Hurst. Although Hurst lost that election, Asa Hutchinson later appointed her to his cabinet — sparking outrage among the staff at the Arkansas Department of Heritage. Freddie Fields was never disciplined for his dishonest approach to the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act, or to student placement within LRSD. Losing Freddie Fields in the LRSD Central Office would cost the state’s Republican Party its inside man.
Little Rock School District is nearing the end of its five years under state control worse off than it was before Asa Hutchinson’s Department of Education deposed the school board and assumed power. Last week, Senator Kim Hammer (R-Benton) attempted to pass a bill, SB 668, that would have allowed four more years of state control. (Relax, it didn’t pass.)
Senator Hammer explained his thinking by saying, “It’s kind of like a child walking. You get them almost to where they can walk and then we turn them loose whether we want to or not. They fall back down again.”
This racist dogwhistle — that a majority-black school district like LRSD (or the other districts currently under state control) is like a “child” who must be taught to walk — is dangerous for two reasons: First, racism is a big enough problem in Arkansas, already. It took military force to integrate Little Rock’s public schools. Shouldn’t we at least try to avoid backsliding?
Second, and perhaps more insidious: The notion that LRSD is childlike represents a paternalistic view that blinds white lawmakers to the fact that black people are their equals in intelligence, virtue, and corruptibility. LRSD doesn’t need Asa Hutchinson or Johnny Key to teach it how to run its schools. LRSD (and every public school in Arkansas) needs its government to enforce the law.
We have laws against child abuse. We have laws against fraud. We have laws against extortion, witness tampering, obstruction of justice, and filing false police reports.Instead of wading into the micro-management of a school district, why doesn’t Arkansas work harder to prosecute illegal acts? Probably because Attorney General Leslie Rutledge — like Senator Alan Clark and Lieutenant Governor Tim Griffin — is firmly in the pocket of the “school choice” movement. These powerful privatizers are waiting to dismember LRSD and sell it off — below market value — to charter schools funded by Walton money and federal grants.
These are not “personnel issues,” or political problems that require bold lobbying in order to effect legislative change. This is unchecked, deliberately concealed, criminal behavior.