A Chilliwack teacher who repeatedly touched a colleague on the buttocks was handed a five-day, retroactive suspension by the branch of the Ministry of Education that governs teachers.
The Teacher Regulation Branch (TRB) posted the resolution agreement between the commissioner of the TRB and Lancer Kevin Price on its website at the end of October.
On three separate occasions in 2017 Price harassed an unnamed colleague by touching her or him on the buttocks.
That colleague “reported feeling very uncomfortable by these incidents.”
On Dec. 20, 2017, School District 33 issued Price a letter of discipline and suspended him without pay for 10 days, a suspension served in January of 2018.
He was transferred from the school he was at – also not named in the agreement – and not permitted to hold the position of school or district counsellor for the remainder of his time as a district employee. He was also ordered to participate in counselling “aimed at assisting him in understanding the parameters of appropriate, professional workplace behaviour.”
Also as part of the agreement, Price agreed to a five-day, retroactive suspension under the Teachers Act, a suspension that was served back in January.
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A source told The Progress that Price at one point worked at Rosedale Traditional Community School as a counsellor, and he is currently listed as being on staff at Chilliwack Secondary.
This wasn’t the first time Price was disciplined by the Chilliwack school district. In 2009, he was handed a letter of discipline after an investigation found he sexually harassed two teaching colleagues by making sexually suggestive comments and gestures to them.
“The District transferred Price to a different school and required him to participate in counselling.”
The TRB is the branch of the Ministry of Education that administers professional regulation for over 68,000 certified educators in the province.
Decisions against teachers in the Chilliwack district by the TRB are not common. Before Price, the last one was against a teacher on call in 2017 who failed to properly supervise students in a welding/metal work class. The students caused more than one explosion using a welding rod canister.
The most high profile incident was that of John Patrick Davy in 2015. Davy was a Greendale elementary school teacher who was sentenced to two and a half years in jail in 2014 after he was found with more than 26,000 images and 866 videos of child pornography.
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paul.henderson@theprogress.com
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