Jul 29, 2016 3 min read

Peters Township School District has placed a former high school teacher on unpaid leave following the state Department of Education’s revocation of his teaching certificate.

James C. Whalen, 50, who goes by Christopher Whalen, was given an opportunity to have a hearing before the school board on Aug. 1, according to board solicitor Jocelyn Kramer. Because Whalen gave no indication he would attend, the hearing was canceled, she said.

The district fired Whalen in 2012 when accusations surfaced that he had an inappropriate relationship with a student while working in Virginia more than a decade and a half ago. He appealed the firing, and in arbitrator ruled in 2013 that he must be reinstated.

The district, however, refused, and he had since been on paid leave until July 18, when the school board voted to place Whalen on unpaid leave. For privacy purposes, district employees facing discipline are identified by numbers, not names, at public meetings.

Whalen was also issued a statement of charges at that time, Kramer said.

The board is scheduled to vote on Whalen’s termination at its Aug. 8 board meeting.

Whalen’s salary was not available, but the average teacher’s salary in Peters is in excess of $70,000, according to the district.

Documents filed with the state show that Whalen’s certificate, which was for teaching mathematics in seventh through 12th grades, was revoked July 6. The certificate is necessary to teach in a public school in Pennsylvania.

“The educator pursued and maintained a romantic and sexually intimate relationship with a student over an approximately two-year time period starting when the student was 14,” according to certificate action details provided by the Department of Education. “The educator also accessed pornography on his school-issued computer.”

Whalen, whom Peters Township hired prior to the start of the 2006-07 school year, waived his right to a hearing when the accusations first surfaced.

The allegations against Whalen came from a woman, who is not identified in court documents, who now lives and works in South Africa. In Virginia, records state, she entered high school in the fall of 1997 and got to know Whalen, who was described as “a popular young teacher.”

She testified at the arbitration hearing that during her junior year, in late 1999, their relationship became physical and then, in 2000, became sexual, according to an arbitrator’s report.

Jeannine French, Peters Township School District superintendent, declined to common specifically on Whalen.

“We do everything within our power and the law to protect our children,” she said.