The ethics quandary over school teachers organizing trips with their students is a real problem. It’s also a solvable one, but a solution will require collaboration rather than a standoff.
The conflict first arose in April when attorneys for the state Ethics Commission advised that established programs of educational field trips that teachers organize with tour companies ran afoul of the state ethics code.
The trouble, according to the commission, is that teachers act as agents for the travel companies, disseminating marketing materials about the trip to students and families and receive the trip for themselves in concert with that effort.
Teachers and their representatives — specifically, the Hawaii State Teachers Association — have bristled about the intimation that teachers are receiving a “gift,” a tangible benefit they receive at no cost.
Teachers are working with their students while on the trip, which provide an educational benefit to students, according to the HSTA.
On Aug. 27 the commission issued its most recent advisory against the arrangement, and the HSTA responded on the same day with a “petition for a declaratory order.”
Corey Rosenlee, the union president, said the association also is “exploring all legal options,” so the challenge could drag on for quite a while.
Nobody disputes the notion that the educational trips can be a benefit to public school students — and, said state Ethics Commission Executive Director Les Kondo, the ethics panel has never said that teachers should not be allowed to take free trips to serve as chaperones on the trips.
The problem, Kondo told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, is how these trips are organized, working directly through individual teachers, which puts them in an ethically compromised position.
In researching its advisory earlier this year, the commission learned that many of these trips constitute an arrangement between the teacher as organizer and the travel company that hopes to get the business of student groups.
At its Tuesday meeting, the Board of Education formed an investigative committee to devise a solution. Superintendent Kathryn Matayoshi said the DOE is drafting a proposal for commission review.
One concept floated by BOE member Brian DeLima was that the Department of Education could take the leading role in vetting and organizing the trips, not the teachers.Kondo showed the board promotional materials teachers distributed to the students for the travel companies, one of which represented that students who go on the trips get better grades. Such an assertion is misleading and more geared at making the sale than at conveying reliable information about the optional trip.
Instead of working through teachers, travel companies could make the donation to the state. The DOE should implement basic procedures to review applications from teachers to take the trips.
If kept simple, this sounds like one reasonable approach for ensuring that the trips have a legitimate educational purpose and itinerary, and that any benefits beyond that purpose — additional travelers coming along, for example — would be paid for as a private expense.
Lawmakers may want to review the language of the ethics code with this in mind, to clarify that the provisions barring gifts above $200 and avoiding conflicts of interest concern gifts to individuals, and that agency controls of the donations could insulate state employees from such concerns.
But even without that refinement, the DOE and the HSTA should find common ground with the commission, allowing extracurricular travel to continue. This, rather than legal battles, would be the ethical course of action, and the right thing to do.
