HARROD — Allen East Superintendent Mel Rentschler wasted no time holding meetings and bringing in the Western Ohio Critical Incident Stress Management Team to his school once news hit of former band director Dennis Dellifield being investigated for possible illegal activities involving children.
Dellifield resigned from the school March 31, 2016, after he was accused of inappropriately touching a girl. Recently, a boy reported to the Ada Police Department that Dellifield acted inappropriately toward him, including requesting a photo of the boy’s genitalia.
Rentschler invited the stress management team to the school Monday to help teachers be prepared.
“We had an incident meeting with the staff because you don’t know what’s going to come out of the woodwork with these things,” Rentschler said. “We are making no assumptions because he has not been arrested, so therefore, we aren’t really talking about him, but we have to have staff prepared if kids want to talk about it or ask questions or come forward and say I was affected by this. I just didn’t want a teacher to walk into a classroom and be blindsided. Teachers are mandatory reporters, and if somebody reports something to them, they have to know what to do. That was the gist of the meeting.”
The district also scheduled a meeting Tuesday for parents wanting to ask questions of the Western Ohio Critical Incident Stress Management Team.
Rentschler said Dellifield was with the district 44 years. He said just by the very nature of the legal system, the course of action can be lengthy.
“The legal system has to work its way, and it could take months for this thing to go through the legal system. We may be dealing with this as a staff and with the students for a lot of months,” Rentschler said.
Rentschler called on the residents of Allen East to overcome this situation.
“Yes, there are probably a lot of people shocked by this and upset. But we aren’t going to let him define us. We’re going to move on,” Rentschler said.
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