School official resigns amid porn allegation
Martin Griffin, former chief administrative officer at PVUSD, is also a bishop in the American Catholic Church.
The Palos Verdes Unified School District accepted the resignation last month of a high ranking official after parents discovered an online video that appeared to show him masturbating on camera.
Chief academic officer Martin Griffin was dismissed in a closed door meeting Thursday Oct 24. The video was just one of the complaints brought by parents and teachers about Griffin, who was hired primarily to help implement the federal Common Core Standards this year.
Griffin is also a bishop in the American Catholic Church, a small independent denomination founded in 1999 that has similar doctrine to the Roman Catholic Church but allows clergy to marry or have same-sex unions. Calls to numbers associated with Griffin and the church in San Diego were not returned.
As part of a settlement with the district, PVUSD officials agreed to pay Griffin his full salary of $135,000 per year until March or until he finds other employment.
“I’m frustrated in a sense that the district is paying him through March and he hadn’t really worked since September,” said parent Linda Reid. “That’s a whole teacher salary being flushed down the toilet and just handed to somebody.”
District Superintendent Walker Williams said he couldn’t talk specifically about the personnel matter, other than to say they weighed every option.
“We looked at all of the aspects to this and felt like we made a decision in the best interest of the school district,” Williams said.
Reid and other parents started looking into Griffin after interactions with several principals and teachers left them irked. So she did some internet searching and filed a public records request for his resume. She found he had come from the Sweetwater Union High School District near San Diego, where at least five school district officials were indicted for accepting kickbacks.
“He had so many jobs and so many places where teachers gave him a vote of no confidence,” Reid said. “He seemed to job hop and even changed his name at one point. It was the kind of stuff that made you wonder why we hired this guy.”
Reid and others, including former school board member Joan Davidson, blame Griffin and his leadership style for leading to a wave of principal resignations last year, including Nick Stephany at PV High.
But Williams contends much of the turnover last year was due to an early retirement incentive the district offered and nothing to do with Griffin. About 35 employees took them up on that offer including eight principals.
“I believe we have hired some quality people,” Williams said. “We can always reflect on whether we can do things better and this is one of those opportunities.”
The district hired Griffin last year to replace its assistant superintendent. Along with Griffin, they hired three other administrators to help bring the district into compliance with the federal government’s new Common Core Standards.
PVUSD will receive $2.3 million over the next two years to spend on professional development, technology, instructional materials or text books. None of that money can be spent on teacher or administrative salaries. Part of the standards call for students to take common exams on electronic devices, in many cases a student’s own device.
Ironically, it was Griffin administering a program that would give students greater access to the internet and the type of material he’s alleged to have posted.
“They say you can bring your own device,” Davidson said. “The problem with that is there is no firewall. That’s very disturbing.”
Davidson believes the district is not ready to implement the standards and that it should apply for a waiver like several districts featured on the east coast.
“Do we want to accept the mandate that we have to have a computer for every child?” Davidson said. “The child comes first, not the computer. A child is going to learn from a good teacher and small class size and not with an iPad in their hands.” ER