by Nick Delgado

Guam - A former Department of Education teacher is working to file a lawsuit against the agency after he says they failed to act on his complaint that alleges staff at J.P. Torres Alternative School failed to do their jobs. Timothy Constantine says his resignation from the school system was a result of a lack of accountability happening at the Santa Rita school.

"People don't come to work and still get paid for it," he told KUAM News. "I was a teacher there and taught science for 7th and 8th graders and I have not one time had a teacher's aide in my classroom. Ever."

Constantine says he filed a complaint with DOE, alleging that several teacher's aides were always nowhere to be found on campus during the school day and would only come in to collect their paychecks. "I look around and some of them are not even on the campus because they are not at work, that's where the fraud comes in where they say they come to school and work some of them are not even showing up and getting paid - that's a fact," he continued.

He adds that other staffers at the school have been making this same complaint for years and he says still nothing has been done. He is plans to file a lawsuit against doe, as he says the aides are critical to have, especially since it is an alternative learning facility.

"We had a situation where people fight, spit, throw things at you and they have to be escorted out of the classroom so that I can maintain the atmosphere to teach those students," Constantine added. "And I can't do that if don't have a teachers aide and I did not have a teacher's aide."

DOE deputy superintendent Arlene Unpingco confirms that there was an internal investigation conducted into the complaint, however she says that the results of that investigation show that there has been no wrongdoing conducted by any of the staff at the Santa Rita campus.

She said, "The department had completed its investigation and as a result the evidence that we have does not sustain the employee's allegation...we are continuing to address these issues that come before us and review the policies and if we need to approach the board or perhaps strengthen the policy or amend the policy then we have a committee consisting of principals and division heads that will research the policy and provide the recommendation to the superintendent.

Unpingco confirms that the investigation included claims that a teacher's aide allegedly took nude photos of a student and distributed it throughout the campus last year. While she says adverse action was taken, KUAM News has learned from school staff that the aide was placed back at the campus.

"We got perverts down there, we got people that talk about having sex with children there amongst other people that work there [sic]," Constantine stated. And while he feels top management at the school need to be further questioned about his claims, Unpingco is urging DOE employees to report all wrong doing that is happening in the schools immediately.

"Again, we would have to conduct our investigation; but again it's really the school administrators are held to the highest standards along with all the employees and if again a complaint is made then we would look into that situation," she said.

Unpingco adds that they are reviewing DOE's standard operating procedures to determine if more training is needed for division heads.