The Issue The issue presented is whether Respondent is guilty of the allegations in the Amended Administrative Complaint filed against her, and, if so, what disciplinary action should be taken against her, if any.
Findings Of Fact Respondent Adela Popescu holds Florida Educator's Certificate 876674 covering the area of mathematics, which was valid through June 30, 2006. She was employed by the Broward County School District as a math teacher. The Florida Teacher Certification Examination ("FTCE") is a statewide examination. It is given four times a year at multiple locations. The Department of Education contracts with the Institute of Instructional Research and Practice of the University of South Florida to administer the examination, and the Institute contracts with persons to serve as room proctors and to grade the essay part of the general knowledge portion of the examination. The general knowledge portion of the examination is a basic skills test. Respondent applied to take the general knowledge portion of the test on April 16, 2005. That portion required the examinees to write a short essay on a choice of topics. The Department provided to Respondent, along with her admission card allowing her to take the examination, the Department's written guidelines prohibiting cheating on the examination and itemizing some activities considered cheating following the words "including but not limited to." Respondent took the essay portion of the general knowledge examination on April 16, 2005. At the beginning of the examination, the examinees were given written instructions. The instructions specifically provided: "You will have 50 minutes to plan, write, and proofread an ORIGINAL essay on one of the two topics presented below." Two topics were presented and then the following sentence provided: "Read the two topics again and select the one on which you wish to write your ORIGINAL essay." The word "original" was in capital letters in both sentences. In addition to the written instructions, the room supervisor for the test read the following instructions to the group of examinees: You must write an original essay that specifically and directly responds to the topic you select. Pre-prepared essays that are discovered to contain memorized sentences or passages will be marked accordingly. For example, if the essay raters discover passages that appear in two or more essays, the essays will be brought to the attention of the Florida Department of Education. The above-quoted language was read three times in succession in order to emphasize the need to write an original essay. Therefore, the requirement that the essay be original was presented to the examinees two times in writing and three times verbally, for a total of five times. There was no minimum or maximum length to the essay. The topics given required no particular level of knowledge of anything; rather, the topics were akin to asking an elementary school student to write an essay on what the child did during the summer vacation. It is surprising to find such a basic task on an examination given to college graduates, but at hearing the Department presented testimony to the effect that it is only trying to ascertain if the examinee can communicate extemporaneously, i.e., whether he or she is capable of writing a note to a student's parents. The five-paragraph-long essay that Respondent turned in as her original work is virtually identical to an essay the Department has seen so many times that Department staff refer to it as "the lush green hills essay." Admitted in evidence were the essays of three examinees who took the exam prior to Respondent and two examinees who took the exam on the same date. The primary differences in the essays arise from inferior skills in the English language so, for example, one examinee wrote "the lunch green hills," Respondent wrote "the lash green hills," one examinee apparently forgot that the green hills were "lush," and one examinee apparently thought there was only one hill. Otherwise, there are few differences in the essays. Respondent's essay was flagged by the essay readers, referred to the chief reader, and then forwarded to the Department. The Department agreed with the determination that the essay was not "original," that Respondent had cheated on the examination, and that her essay should be declared invalid. The Department so advised Respondent by letter dated May 16, 2005. In addition to advising Respondent that her score on the essay subtest of the general knowledge examination was invalid, the Department also advised Respondent that she had a right to an administrative hearing on that determination. Respondent did request an administrative hearing, and the case was transferred to the Division of Administrative Hearings and assigned Case No. 05-2318. Before the final hearing in that case, Respondent filed a Notice of Voluntary Dismissal of her request for a hearing. There is a dearth of evidence in the record in this cause as to how or when Respondent was issued a Florida Educator's Certificate. However, the parties have stipulated that she was licensed, with her license expiring June 30, 2006. Prior to that date, the Commissioner of Education issued the Amended Administrative Complaint which is the subject of this proceeding. There is no evidence as to how Respondent plagiarized someone else's work: whether she brought it into the examination, whether she memorized it, or whether she obtained it through the use of technology. The method she used to cheat, however, is irrelevant since she represented someone else's work as her own and admits it was not an original essay. Shortly before the final hearing in this cause, the parties filed a number of motions typically designed to resolve a case without the need for a hearing. Petitioner argued that jurisdiction over this matter should be relinquished since by Respondent's admission that she did not turn in an original essay, which constituted cheating, there were no longer genuine issues of material fact. In opposition to that motion, Respondent asserted that Petitioner was relying on two policies which were required to be promulgated as rules but were not, thereby preventing Petitioner from taking disciplinary action against Respondent. Respondent alleges that the two unpromulgated rules upon which Petitioner relies are the definition of cheating, which appeared in the materials allowing Respondent admission to the examination, and the examination instructions, which required that an original essay be submitted and which were provided to Respondent twice in writing and three times verbally. Respondent did not raise these issues in her administrative challenge to the Department of Education's decision to declare her essay to be invalid, which would have been the appropriate proceeding since the question of whether she should be given a score for her essay or whether it should be declared invalid was the subject matter of that proceeding, not this proceeding. The two challenged policies, the definition of cheating and the essay instructions, are not rules and, therefore, need not be promulgated pursuant to Section 120.54, Florida Statutes. Further, neither the definition of cheating nor the essay instruction is vague, and neither vests unbridled discretion in anyone. The words "cheating" and "original" are not statutory terms, requiring interpretation. Further, they are not specialized terms unique to the Commissioner of Education or the Department of Education. They are words of common usage. Copying someone else's work and representing it to be one's own is a willful and intentional act. It is also unethical and dishonest to plagiarize.
Recommendation Based on the foregoing Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law, it is RECOMMENDED that a final order be entered finding Respondent guilty of Counts 2, 3, and 5-7, as alleged in the Amended Administrative Complaint filed in this cause and suspending or revoking Respondent's educator's certificate for a period of one year. DONE AND ENTERED this 23rd day of August, 2006, in Tallahassee, Leon County, Florida. S LINDA M. RIGOT Administrative Law Judge Division of Administrative Hearings The DeSoto Building 1230 Apalachee Parkway Tallahassee, Florida 32399-3060 (850) 488-9675 SUNCOM 278-9675 Fax Filing (850) 921-6847 www.doah.state.fl.us Filed with the Clerk of the Division of Administrative Hearings this 23rd day of August, 2006. COPIES FURNISHED: Kathleen M. Richards, Executive Director Education Practices Commission Department of Education Turlington Building 325 West Gaines Street, Room 224 Tallahassee, Florida 32399-0400 Daniel J. Woodring, General Counsel Department of Education Turlington Building 325 West Gaines Street, Room 1224 Tallahassee, Florida 32399-0400 Marian Lambeth, Program Specialist Bureau of Educator Standards Department of Education Turlington Building 325 West Gaines Street, Room 224-E Tallahassee, Florida 32399-0400 Charles T. Whitelock, Esquire Whitelock & Associates, P.A. 300 Southeast 13th Street Fort Lauderdale, Florida 33316 Mary F. Aspros, Esquire Meyer and Brooks, P.A. 2544 Blairstone Pines Drive Post Office Box 1547 Tallahassee, Florida 32301
