Lyons Township Won't Say Why Teacher Was Warned

LA GRANGE, IL — Lyons Township High School is keeping under wraps the details about why it publicly reprimanded a teacher last month for "unacceptable and unprofessional conduct." At a meeting, the school board voted for a resolution warning teacher Greg Elwood it would suspend him without pay or fire him as a tenured teacher if he repeated such conduct.

Patch filed a public records request for the information related to the resolution on Elwood, a teacher in the applied technology department. The school produced a chain of emails between Elwood and the human resources director indicating the school took issue with "an interaction" Elwood had with another member of the applied technology department.

The school board's "notice to remedy" to Elwood said his conduct was described in a memo by the school's superintendent, Tim Kilrea. Patch then filed a follow-up public records request for Kilrea's memo.

The school denied the request, saying it was exempt as a "preliminary draft" under the Freedom of Information Act.

"The record is a memorandum with the recommendations of action for the Board of Education. Any factual data within the document is inextricably intertwined with the recommendations and opinions of the administrator," the school said in an email to Patch.

Maryam Judar, executive director of the Elmhurst-based Citizen Advocacy Center, said the school district could have blacked out the parts of the superintendent's memo that included opinions and left remaining the facts of the situation.

"They should examine the whole document and redact what they need to," said Judar, who is also a lawyer. "You could argue there is a public interest in this information."

Public records denials can be appealed to the attorney general's office.

Elwood's situation was apparently no mere human resources issue because it involved the school board in a public setting. The school said it last issued a notice to remedy in 2019. The last one before that was 2015. These few publicly reprimanded teachers are out of a 250-member faculty. As a school spokesman said in an email. "Notice to remedy is rare."

In an interview, Superintendent Kilrea said the school doesn't openly discuss personnel matters. He said the school is following its lawyers' advice that the memo is exempt from the public records law.

Elwood teaches furniture and cabinet making and home maintenance and repair. He made $134,000 in 2018, according to OpenTheBooks.com.

Elwood has not returned emailed messages for comment.