By: Scott Brinton and Hector Flores
It was 2:30 p.m. Only a short while earlier, Central High School District Superintendent Dr. Thomas Caramore had released the two from their teaching duties and ordered them to perform desk duty until further notice at the Brookside School, which is an administration office in North Merrick.
The move came two weeks after a Pennsylvania grand jury criticized the five coaches who ran a training camp in Preston Park, Pa. -- including McElroy and Canestro. The report said the coaches "lacked commonsense accountability when it came to managing or running the camp," at which three varsity players sexually molested three younger teammates with a broomstick, pine cones and a golf ball over the course of a week.
The grand jury report also said that child-endangerment charges against the coaches were unwarranted, and that none of them knew about the attacks while at the camp. The three victims have now filed lawsuits against the Central District, seeking unspecified damages.
Only McElroy, 49, and Canestro, 36, held full-time teaching jobs at Mepham. The other three coaches were hired for the football season.
In a prepared statement, Caramore was careful to note that reassigning McElroy and Canestro to the Brookside School shouldn't be construed as a sign that district officials believe they were negligent. The district is still investigating the case. Transferring the coaches to Brookside, Caramore said, is not a "prejudgment or determination by the school board" that the coaches did, or did not, do anything wrong. (For the superintendent's full statement, see shaded box, page 20.)
subhead: Coaches angry
Still, McElroy and Canestro are angry that they were taken out of the classroom. At the news conference, McElroy lashed out at the Central District administration. He said district officials had asked the five coaches last September to say nothing about the case publicly, and they agreed. "We were the team players," McElroy said.
Since then, however, the district has sought to "scapegoat" the coaches for the attacks, he said. All five lost their football coaching positions last November. Then, this winter, McElroy and Canestro were removed from their spring coaching posts. McElroy was to coach golf, and Canestro, baseball.
The two are deeply concerned now that they're no longer teaching, McElroy said in a telephone interview with the Herald last Thursday. They believe their teaching jobs -- and their ability to earn a living -- may be on the line.
In order for the former coaches to be fired as teachers, they would have to go through a 3020-A proceeding, a series of state-required hearings that are mediated by a third-party arbitrator. During the hearings, the two would have to be found guilty of gross negligence or misconduct to lose their jobs.
Some in the community, in particular a handful of Bellmore-Merrick Parents for Change members, have called for 3020-A proceedings to be brought against the coaches. Bellmore-Merrick Parents, which formed in the wake of the attacks, has not taken a position on the proceedings. The group says it is seeking a state Education Department investigation into the attacks and the district's handling of them.
Central officials have said nothing about 3020-A proceedings. But McElroy noted that school districts often move teachers out of the classroom before conducting the hearings. The coach said his wife is particularly worried. "She's incredibly upset, more so than I can believe," said McElroy, the father of three, one of whom is in college. The Canestros have two small children.
The two former coaches recently hired a Garden City attorney, Thomas Liotti, to represent them. And McElroy said the pair are fully prepared to fight if necessary to keep their jobs.
Last Wednesday, McElroy said the whole truth about the case hasn't come out yet, but it would. His remarks may portend a battle between the two former coaches and Central District officials. McElroy said that he and Canestro have gone along with anything the district administration has asked of them. But now that they've been removed from the classroom, "We are no longer team players," he said.
McElroy said that even if he gets his teaching job back, his reputation was impugned beyond repair when he was taken out of the classroom. "My whole career is destroyed from both ends" -- teaching and coaching, he said.
subhead: Parties react
Robert Kelly, an attorney for two of the sex-assault victims, said taking McElroy and Canestro out of the classroom was the right thing to do. "My clients are certainly pleased that the coaches have been removed," Kelly said. "We think that by the district's decision, they agree with my clients that these coaches should not have been supervising children."
One victim's uncle said of the decision, "It's a long time coming. It's way overdue. It should have been done when [district officials] first started conducting their investigation so the [victims] wouldn't feel uncomfortable.
"Obviously something went wrong," the uncle continued. "Criminal acts were committed on other students under [the coaches'] watch."
Early last Thursday morning, Mepham Principal John Didden called an urgent meeting to inform staff members that McElroy and Canestro wouldn't be returning to the high school any time soon. Teachers expressed anger and frustration about the move.
One Mepham teacher, who declined to be identified, said the coaches should not have been removed from the classroom. They followed district policy at the camp, and they didn't know about the attacks, the teacher said.
Now Mepham faculty members are wondering whether the former coaches will keep their full-time jobs, and whether the district administration would support other teachers in the event of another catastrophe that might happen on their watch.
"It puts a question in our minds how much extra we want to do," the teacher said. "We're paid to teach and be there from 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., and create a safe and civil environment in our class. If you're a coach, you're really not covered [by the district]. It's really nebulous what your role is."
The Bellmore-Merrick United Secondary Teachers Association, the teachers' union, issued a prepared statement on Monday. It read in part, "The reassignment of Kevin McElroy and Art Canestro is disappointing and troubling ... With no prior notice to the union or coaches, and without charging coaches McElroy and Canestro with misconduct or violation of the contract or district policy, the superintendent arbitrarily and capriciously removed the coaches from the classroom." (For the union's full statement, see shaded box, page 3.)
Students whom the Herald spoke with outside Mepham last Friday voiced concern. The students didn't want their last names used. Lindsay, a 10th-grader who had McElroy for social studies, said his classes are reeling.
A substitute with no knowledge of the students replaced him on Thursday. The timing was poor because, Lindsay said, the students are gearing up for a social studies Regents. And she said they are already behind. McElroy, she said, was called away from teaching several times because of the sex-abuse case. "We haven't learned that much because he hasn't been around that much," she said.
Joanna, an 11th-grader, said, "If they kick [the coaches] out of our district, they will never work again. They were good teachers, and now they are tainted for life."
At Brookside, McElroy is preparing materials for the Central District's social studies curriculum. Last Thursday he wrote a lesson plan. Canestro is helping to revise the district's coaching handbook, according to sources.
McElroy noted how difficult this case will be for him and Canestro financially now that they've hired their own attorney. "We'll be broke by the end of this, " he said with a touch of resignation in his voice.
