{"id":333871,"date":"2026-07-09T02:00:26","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T02:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/333871\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T02:00:26","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T02:00:26","slug":"duval-schools-investigated-list-of-douglas-anderson-teachers-5-years-after-student-sent-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/333871\/","title":{"rendered":"Duval Schools investigated ‘list’ of Douglas Anderson teachers 5 years after student sent it"},"content":{"rendered":"

The email from a Douglas Anderson grad arrived in then-Principal Melanie Hammer\u2019s inbox shortly after midnight the morning of Aug. 18, 2020.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a list of names you should know, and if any still teach at the school in 2020, cover your a** and fire them\u2026 cause you aren\u2019t the first person to get this list. And they all f*** children,\u201d the note read. <\/p>\n

What followed were the names of 12 Douglas Anderson teachers. Some still worked at the school.<\/p>\n

Jacksonville Today first reported on the email<\/a> as part of a series that examined how the district had handled years\u2019 worth of reports of teacher misconduct at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts following former vocal teacher Jeffrey Clayton\u2019s 2023 arrest<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Initially, it was unclear whether\u00a0the district investigated the teachers named in the email. New documents, though, provide a picture of the investigation that followed \u2014 five years later.<\/p>\n

Puzzle pieces<\/p>\n

Jacksonville Today first requested the email through a public records request submitted in mid-February 2025, and received it about a month later after paying a fee of $24.12. New documents from the city of Jacksonville show the General Counsel\u2019s Office was also in search of the email concurrently. Before releasing it to Jacksonville Today, Duval Schools\u2019 records custodian sent it to several high-level district administrators on March 5, 2025. <\/p>\n

In one email exchange, about a week before the files were released to Jacksonville Today, the district\u2019s then-lawyer, Ray Poole, sent the \u201clist\u201d to Rita Mairs, the lawyer in the city\u2019s General Counsel Office who is assigned most of the cases brought by Douglas Anderson accusers.<\/p>\n

\u201cSee attachment. I just received it,\u201d Poole wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cWow,\u201d Mairs responded.<\/p>\n

\u201cYep,\u201d Poole said.<\/p>\n

\u2018A duty to report\u2019<\/p>\n

The newly released documents from Duval Schools show the district\u2019s Professional Standards Office waited six weeks to open an investigation last year; it received the email on March 5, 2025, from the records custodian, but did not officially open its investigation until April 17.<\/p>\n

Mairs on April 16 asked professional standards Supervisor David Farcas questions about the district\u2019s response to the email.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst, In the event this has not been done, here is the list of names, many of who (sic) we know went on after 2020 to be investigated due to inappropriate communications or sexual conduct with children,\u201d Mairs wrote.<\/p>\n

She also urged the professional standards office to consider whether an administrator named Scott Schneider had responded appropriately to the email.<\/p>\n

\"\"Documents from City of Jacksonville<\/p>\n

Five years prior, in 2020, Schneider was the regional superintendent in charge of Douglas Anderson. When then-Principal Melanie Hammer received the \u201clist\u201d email, she soon forwarded it to Schneider, her supervisor.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2025, as Mairs evaluated the documents, Schneider was by then the district\u2019s chief of schools. She asked Farcas if Schneider had been \u201cinvestigated for his handling of this matter.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIf not, I strongly encourage the District to do so, as Mr. Schneider is currently our Chief of Schools and not a former employee,\u201d Mairs wrote. \u201cThis email chain will likely surface if we are unable to resolve our current DA cases involving Clayton<\/a>, and what will we, as a District, have to say for it?\u201d<\/p>\n

Hammer left Duval Schools for a position with the Cathedral Arts Project<\/a> in 2021. She didn\u2019t respond to Jacksonville Today\u2019s request for comment.<\/p>\n

Duval Schools\u2019 investigation of Schneider concluded that he had a \u201cduty to report\u201d what he learned from the email. One year after opening its investigation, on April 16, 2026, the district issued Schneider a letter of reprimand. It\u2019s part of the progressive discipline process, and the letter goes in his personnel file.\u00a0Duval Schools did not renew his contract with the district this summer, and as of July 1, he\u2019s no longer a district employee.<\/p>\n

The discipline report says Schneider\u2019s \u201cactions and inactions led to missed opportunities\u201d to investigate.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a result, numerous students experienced or continued experiencing abuse by educators identified in [the email],\u201d the report reads. \u201cAdditionally, the [School Board] has been sued numerous times based on the conduct of many of the educators listed in [the email], which has affected the public\u2019s continued confidence\u2026and has placed financial strain on\u201d the school board. <\/p>\n

Schneider said that conclusion is \u201cnonsense\u201d in a rebuttal letter also included in his file. He tells Jacksonville Today he did report the email.<\/p>\n

Records received from the district show Hammer forwarded the email to Schneider soon after receiving it.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease see the email below,\u201d she wrote. \u201cIt seems that this alumnus has spoken with the Office of Professional Standards, and the reply from them [is] concerning (as are the allegations). Please let me know what I need to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Schneider replied that the information the student needed to report the allegations to the Florida Department of Children and Families and Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n

That same afternoon, Hammer responded to the student and suggested he file the reports \u201cas the victim of this behavior.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Documents from Duval Schools<\/p>\n

After responding to the student, Hammer again wrote Schneider and asked him if she should share the message with Duval Schools\u2019 professional standards office. She told Schneider that she\u2019d \u201cpreviously contacted DCF,\u201d who advised her they only handle cases involving minors. She asked Schneider if she should share it with police directly.<\/p>\n

He replied, \u201cYou have done what is needed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Schneider tells Jacksonville Today that he took the matter to the office of professional standards himself \u2014 but through an in-person conversation, not an email. They assured him the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office was already investigating, he says.<\/p>\n

There is no record of a JSO investigation of \u201cthe list\u201d in 2020. <\/p>\n

The new documents provided by Duval Schools do include a JSO report dated Dec. 4, 2025, that details an investigation into \u201ca list which was discovered and consisted of teachers and students engaging in sexual activity at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts.\u201d It concludes that the State Attorney\u2019s Office had already investigated the matter, and so \u201cno further assistance was needed from the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office.\u201d<\/p>\n

See something, say something<\/p>\n

A district spokesperson tells Jacksonville Today that through its Know the Line campaign<\/a>, Superintendent Chris Bernier \u201chas consistently emphasized the importance of protecting the safety and well-being of our students and fostering a culture where any suspected misconduct is reported immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n

At a School Board meeting last week, Bernier took a moment to remind the audience about the district\u2019s mandatory reporting responsibilities. State law says every Duval Schools employee is a mandatory reporter.<\/p>\n

He acknowledged it was \u201codd to put this on\u201d his monthly presentation, but said he wanted to include it because many district staff members watch board meetings.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a statutory requirement. We\u2019ve said it numerous times since my arrival because of previous situations that had occurred at other schools,\u201d Bernier said. \u201cWe take this very seriously. There is no room to not report.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The email from a Douglas Anderson grad arrived in then-Principal Melanie Hammer\u2019s inbox shortly after midnight the morning…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":333872,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117],"class_list":["post-333871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=333871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/333871\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/333872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=333871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=333871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=333871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}