B.C. teacher suspended for lying about being suspended
Credit to Author: Stephanie Ip| Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2020 19:51:05 +0000
A B.C. teacher has been suspended after lying on a job application about a previous suspension he received for putting a student in a headlock.
James Earl Bjarnason’s teaching certificate will be suspended for two months, as part of the consent resolution agreement signed Jan. 8.
The agreement details a number of past suspensions and investigations from Bjarnason’s time teaching in Langley and Delta, and attempts to be employed in Surrey and in Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows.
Bjarnason first applied for a job with the Delta school district in December 2017 and was required to complete a background check form. When asked if he had ever been investigated, dismissed, suspended or disqualified at another job, Bjarnason answered “no” and signed acknowledging that his answers were “complete and true in every respect.” Bjarnason was hired.
In reality, Bjarnason had been investigated and suspended in 2011 while teaching in Langley.
The suspension was handed down for not reporting a student’s absence in another class when the student was regularly visiting Bjarnason’s classroom during instructional time, and for putting that same student in a headlock and giving them a noogie.
Bjarnason had also encouraged other students to mock the student, with the goal of embarrassing the student.
As a result, Bjarnason was investigated and handed a two-month suspension.
Bjarnason later quit his job in Langley, just months after returning to work, when a second investigation found that he had “inappropriately reprimanded a vulnerable student with multiple disabilities and special needs and failed to treat students with respect and dignity.”
Both the 2011 suspension and the 2012 resignation in Langley were also investigated by the B.C. Teacher Regulation Branch.
For lying about the previous suspension and investigation, Bjarnason was fired from the Delta school district in November 2018.
The consent resolution agreement also detailed how Bjarnason applied to work with the Surrey and Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows school districts in the summer of 2017.
In applications for each of the districts, Bjarnason again answered “no” when asked on a background check form whether he had ever been investigated, dismissed, suspended or disqualified in another job, and again signed that the information given was correct.
When investigated in November 2019, Bjarnason lied and said he had disclosed his previous suspension when applying to Surrey when in fact he had answered “no.” For this, the B.C. Commissioner for Teacher Regulation issued Bjarnason a citation.
As part of the consent resolution agreement, Bjarnason’s teaching certificate will be suspended for two months, effective April and May 2020.