Wisconsin school district investigating fmr. superintendent

GLENWOOD TOWNSHIP, Wis. (FOX 9) - A Wisconsin school district is investigating whether its former superintendent improperly billed the district for thousands of dollars in continuing education classes he never took.

Tim Johnson, 51, who served for nine years as the Glenwood City School District Superintendent, resigned in May after FOX 9 began asking questions about the reimbursements, telling the school board it was time for him "to start a new professional journey and challenge."

The new superintendent, Patrick Olson, sent a letter to Johnson on Dec. 6 asking him to sign a consent form under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) that would allow the district to obtain a copy of his transcript from Viterbo University in La Crosse, Wisconsin. 

"The purpose of this FERPA release is for you to allow the District to directly verify that you were properly entitled to the public funds that were paid to you by the District for your attendance at Viterbo University," Olson wrote. 

Olson sent a final request on Jan. 1 that said if the district did not receive the FERPA consent form by Jan. 12 the district "may turn the matter over to outside investigators."

The Glenwood City School Board is expected to decide on a course of action at its Jan. 22 meeting. The discussion will be in a session closed to the public because it involves a personnel and legal matter.

Bringing the receipts

A former substitute teacher, Amy Dopkins, first raised questions two years ago about the authenticity of receipts Johnson had submitted to the district for Viterbo University.

"I’m not out to get him," Dopkins told FOX 9. "But something isn’t right here. And I’m the kind of person who just needs to have an answer."

Dopkins made a public records request for Johnson’s receipts from Viterbo University and the district’s reimbursements to him since 2011. 

Johnson provided only nine receipts covering a three-year period, from August 2017 to December 2020, with course titles like Successful Leadership, Legal Issues in Education, and Organizational Capacity. 

Those nine receipts total $40,700. The payment vouchers were signed by Johnson to himself.

Dopkins looked at the receipts and immediately noticed there was no professional letterhead and the spacing of the lines seemed odd and varied among the receipts. Most of the receipts didn’t contain course numbers or credit information, either.

"It looked like a bad Word document," Dopkins said. "It didn’t have a logo. It looked like cut and paste to me."

Dopkins compared the receipts to one submitted by another school district administrator who was also a Viterbo student. She noticed significant differences in the format. 

Dopkins then asked Johnson for his transcript to confirm he enrolled and attended the classes, but he refused to provide it.

In a June email to Dopkins, Johnson said the expenses were for "doctoral classes at Viterbo" and described her request for public records as "your organized lynch mob against me."

Talk to the Registrar

What is not in dispute, is that Johnson attended Viterbo University from January 2012 through May 2013, when he received his Superintendent Licensure in Educational Administration. 

Viterbo’s Registrar’s Office told FOX 9 by email that Johnson has not attended the school since 2013.

But since that time, the Glenwood City School District has reimbursed Johnson for $81,395 in post-secondary educational expenses, according to a district spreadsheet of Johnson’s compensation over the last decade. 

Dopkins emailed Viterbo two of the receipts Johnson had submitted to the district for reimbursement.

A clerk in Viterbo’s Business Office, Lorie Michaels, replied in an email to Dopkins, "This document did not originate from Viterbo. I hope this helps."

The Registrar’s Office also told Dopkins the course titles from Johnson’s receipts didn’t match classes offered during that time. 

A $25K bonus?

In addition to the reimbursements, Johnson’s employment contracts since the 2017-2018 school year included a $25,000 "performance stipend" to help offset "the cost of graduate courses and other professional development opportunities."

Dopkins wondered why, if Johnson’s contract already paid him $25,000 for continuing education, was he also seeking reimbursement from the district for classes at Viterbo University?

"So, that didn't sit right with me because that was supposed to be part of your $25,000 performance stipend, to help offset the cost of those classes, and you’re getting reimbursed as well? That’s not okay," Dopkins recalled. 

Frustrated by Johnson’s response, Dopkins enlisted the help of a new school board member, Nicole Miller.

Miller said she, too, was concerned when she saw Johnson’s receipts from Viterbo University and the absence of a school logo or detailed class information. 

"What kind of struck me, and threw up a red flag, is that he’s apparently the only one who is signing off on his continuing education records to get reimbursed," Miller said. 

Miller, who was elected to the school board in April 2022, said she brought up the receipts in a closed-door session of her third school board meeting. 

"I was laughed at," she said.

Her fellow school board members ignored the receipts, Miller said, and accused her of "going down a rabbit hole and looking for things that aren’t there and aren’t real."

"They’ve accused me of giving the Glenwood City School District a bad name and that teachers are going to be leaving because of the drama that I’ve created with these questions," Miller said.

Evidence in ‘Personal File’?

The school board president, Lisa Kaiser, told FOX 9 last summer Johnson had shown her transcripts and "other evidence" he attended Viterbo University during the dates in question.

But Kaiser would not elaborate on the nature of the evidence and told FOX 9 she did not have the documents because the records were part of Johnson’s private "personal file," and did not belong to the district.

In an email to school board members in May, Johnson defended his compensation.

As Johnson explained it, the $25,000 performance stipend was negotiated when he became superintendent to compensate him for changes to a healthcare reimbursement account and the cost of insurance that he said, "I have never taken from the District in 19 years of service."

"After review by our attorney, we clarified the language in the next year’s contract to better match the intent of the previous language," Johnson wrote. 

For Johnson’s 2022-2024 contract, the $25,000 performance stipend was no longer tied to graduate studies and professional development, and payment for "graduate courses successfully completed" was now to be reimbursed with "prior approval of the board." 

Johnson’s total compensation for 2022-2023, his last year of employment, included a base salary of $153,812, the re-worded $25,000 performance stipend, and a $30,000 annual contribution to a retirement account. 

Johnson also received $6,240 in lieu of insurance and a $1,000 residency bonus, bringing his total compensation package to $216,052.

Moving on, for less

Two months after his resignation as superintendent of the Glenwood City School District, Johnson accepted a job with the Chippewa Falls School District as Executive Director of Human Resources and Public Relations. 

The job is 50 miles away from his home and pays a salary of $145,471 without additional compensation, $63,341 less than his total compensation as superintendent of the Glenwood City School District. 

Johnson’s participation in a doctoral program at Viterbo University is not mentioned in his resume or any other application materials he provided to the Chippewa Falls School District, which FOX 9 obtained through a public records request. 

After initially describing the receipts issue as a "witch hunt," Johnson declined to comment further on the controversy. 

Kaiser, the school board president, has also declined additional requests for comment.

The current superintendent of the Glenwood City School District, Patrick Olson, declined comment, citing an ongoing investigation. 

‘That’s a teacher’

The lack of transparency has frustrated Miller, the new school board member, who said she has considered resigning after being bullied by fellow school board members and threatened with a lawsuit by the former superintendent simply for seeking answers. 

"It's a close-knit town," she said. 

"We don't want to ruffle feathers. We don't want confrontation. It's easier if we just shove it under the rug and keep moving on," Miller said.

And while the money in question might seem like a rounding error for larger school districts, Miller said it’s a significant expense for a low-income school district with 632 students and a $10 million budget. 

"It’s an astronomical amount for a small school district. That’s a teacher," Miller said.