Maupin v. Independent School Dist. No. 26 of Ottawa County, 54263

• Decision Date: 21 July 1981
• Docket Number: No. 54263,54263
• Citation: 632 P.2d 396
• Parties: Don Ray MAUPIN, Appellant, v. INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 26 OF OTTAWA COUNTY, Oklahoma, Appellee.
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

Page 396

632 P.2d 396

1981 OK 90

Don Ray MAUPIN, Appellant, v. INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 26 OF OTTAWA COUNTY, Oklahoma, Appellee.

No. 54263.

Supreme Court of Oklahoma.

July 21, 1981.

Appeal from the District Court of Ottawa County; Sam C. Fullerton, judge.

Appellant, a tenured teacher, appeals from the refusal of the local School Board to reinstate him to his full employment status and benefits after he was reinstated to his teaching position after a due process hearing under the School Code, 70 O.S.Supp.1977 § 6-103.4 6-103.13. The teacher filed an action in the District Court seeking compensation for his coaching duties. The court sustained the Board's motion for summary judgment.

AFFIRMED.

Fagin, Hewett, Mathews & Fagin by Warner E. Lovell, Jr., Oklahoma City, for appellant.

Rosenstein, Fist & Ringold by J. Douglas Mann, Tulsa, for appellee.

HODGES, Justice.

The only question presented on appeal is the interpretation of 70 O.S.Supp.1977 § 6-103.11(B). ¹ This statute is a part of the School Code which provides due process hearings to tenured teachers when the School Board decides he/she should be "nonreemployed." ² Nonreemployment is a statutorily defined word of art which means the nonrenewal of a teacher's contract under which he/she was teaching upon expiration of his/her contract. ³ A tenured teacher has the right to a hearing concerning nonreemployment before a hearing judge who is an attorney selected by the parties from a list of qualified attorneys. ⁴ The hearing judge is counseled by a person designated by the local board of education and a person designated by the tenured teacher in his/her consideration of educational issues. ⁵ These three persons comprise the hearing panel. The hearing panel is required to prepare a written report within thirty days. ⁶ The hearing panel has the authority under § 6-103.11(B)(1), (2) to 1) order the local board of education to reinstate the tenured teacher with "full employment status and benefits" or 2) to sustain the school board's decision to nonreemploy the teacher.

In this case, the tenured teacher, Don Maupin, appellant, was reinstated by the hearing panel to his teaching position at the Afton Public Schools. The panel did not reinstate him to his coaching duties, ⁷ and he sought relief in district court.

Maupin's contract, under which he was nonreemployed, provided for his employment as a classroom teacher and coach at an annual salary of $13,821.00 ($2,034.00 of which was for performance of his coaching activities). It was his contention before the district court and before this Court on appeal that he was entitled to be compensated at the same rate (plus any increments mandated by Legislative increases) for the year he was reinstated because: 1) 70 O.S.Supp.1977 § 6-102.1(3) means the renewal of a teacher's contract under which he was teaching upon expiration of the contract and 2) mandates reinstatement with full employment status and benefits. It is conceded by the teacher that he would not be entitled to compensation for coaching in future years unless he actually contracted for and performed coaching duties. However, he asserts that the refusal to reinstate him to his coaching position results in a failure to provide full employment status and benefits. The district court held that full employment status and benefits applied only to primary teaching duties and benefits incidental thereto and that it was inapplicable to supplemental duties. We agree.

I

In Oklahoma, teachers contracts are automatically renewed on a continuing basis unless the Board or the teacher acts to prevent the automatic renewal of employment. ⁸ The contract for the ensuing year is Most jurisdictions which have considered the principal duty of teaching and supplemental activities have determined that extra-duty assignments are too far removed from the primary teaching responsibilities of tenured teachers to be protected under the statute. Although none of the jurisdictions which considered the questions have a statute identical to Oklahoma's, we find the reasoning to be valid. A teacher may be an excellent teacher, but a poor glee club director, coach, or 4-H club advisor. Neither the school system nor the student should suffer from possible shortcomings in the extracurricular areas when the teacher's talents can be more suitably directed in another area. Nor should a fine academician suffer because he/she is poorly suited to certain extracurricular assignments.

not subject to the requirement that it contain identical terms as those found in the preceding year's contract. It is only necessary that the teacher receive a contract on the same salary schedule as other teachers in the district receive for the ensuing year. Teachers do not acquire the right to be employed in any particular position, rather the right of a tenured teacher is to continuing employment. Subject to the statutory boundaries, the Board may assign teachers within the school system as they desire. ⁹ Although 70 O.S. 1971 § 6-101(B) prohibits assignment of a teacher to teach a subject in which the teacher does not hold a valid certificate, no certification is necessary for extra-duty assignments such as coaching.

We are particularly persuaded by Kirk v. Miller, 83 Wash.2d 777, 522 P.2d 843 (1974) which held there was not a sufficient nexus between the primary contractual duty of teaching, which requires certification, and coaching, which does not, to justify the conclusion that a contract which separately stated the curricular and extracurricular assignments vests the teacher with the right to coach; and Chiodo v. Board of Education of Special Sch. Dist. No. 1, 298 Minn. 380, 215 N.W.2d 806 (1974) in which the Minnesota Supreme Court determined that a coach is not a teacher under its statute and had no rights to a coaching position. We find that the portions of the contract are severable, and that the continuing contract statute is applicable only to curricular assignments.

The parties have stipulated that a reasonable attorney fee for the prevailing party is $2,490.00 which is awarded to appellee, in addition to an attorney fee of $500.00 for prosecution on this appeal.

AFFIRMED.

IRWIN, C.J., BARNES, V.C.J., and WILLIAMS, LAVENDER, SIMMS and OPALA, JJ., concur.

DOOLIN and HARGRAVE, JJ., concurring in part and dissenting in part.

DOOLIN, Justice, concurring in part, dissenting in part:

Although I concur with the majority that a tenured teacher has no right to reinstatement to a specific teaching position within the system and agree the Board may assign him whatever duties it deems...