Beavercreek H.S. principal warned about ‘inappropriate remarks’ at previous district

Credit: DaytonDailyNews

The Beavercreek High School principal under investigation for misconduct was reprimanded for being inappropriate and mishandling student and personnel issues by the former superintendent of his previous district, Northmont City Schools.

The Dayton Daily News requested and obtained records from George Caras’ personnel file with Northmont schools, where he served as the high school principal from 2008 to 2017.

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Caras is on paid administrative leave from his post as Beavercreek High School’s principal while school officials there investigate alleged misconduct. The allegations were characterized as a “personnel matter” in a letter to parents from Beavercreek Superintendent Paul Otten.

The Northmont records include three memos sent to Caras in 2013 from Sarah C. Zatik, then superintendent of the Northmont district.

The first memo in the file, dated April 23, 2013, refers to the controversial resignation of Northmont’s long-time basketball coach Jim Brown.

Zatik outlined four main concerns in the memo, the most serious of which involved Brown’s resignation letter, which Brown had not written, had not read and had not signed.

“This borders on fraud,” Zatik’s letter reads.

The other two letters from Zatik to Caras came the last two days of May 2013, referencing two separate incidents of concern.

Zatik wrote she had received complaints from parents of students whose vehicles were spray-painted as part of a senior prank tradition that Caras allegedly permitted.

“Next year, and every year after, we will not allow car painting on our property,” Zatik’s letter reads. “To allow students, inexperienced drivers, to paint on their windows is not a good practice.”

The last memo in Caras’ Northmont file refers to a story Caras told during a graduation speech in front of about 1,000 people that Zatik considered “inappropriate and disrespectful” about the school resource officer.

Zatik referred to other “numerous complaints … regarding your remarks.”

“This memo is a warning. You are on thin ice,” Zatik’s letter reads. “The board and the central office hold their breath every time you go to the microphone.”

Officials at Kettering City Schools, where Caras was an elementary school principal, said there were no negative remarks or disciplinary items in Caras’ personnel file.

This newspaper has asked for Caras personnel file at Beavercreek.

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