Brevard County Commissioner John Tobia has been placed on paid administrative leave amid allegations that he used county staff to help grade papers and perform other course-related work for his teaching job at Valencia College , a school official said Wednesday.
The claims came to light during a Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigation into misconduct allegations against Tobia raised by a former staffer. No charges were filed and the case was closed.
Tobia told FLORIDA TODAY that staff members did help with some ancillary tasks related to his courses, including assisting him with entering grades into the college's online system, but never actually graded any coursework.
He is currently running for Brevard County Supervisor of Elections after term limits prevented him from running again for county commission. He faces current elections Supervisor Tim Bobanic in next Tuesday's Republican primary election.
Tobia is an instructor at the Orlando-based college, where he teaches history and political science, in addition to his commission work. His teaching salary last year was $100,667, according to his most recent financial disclosure form.
Staffers in Tobia's county commission office told FDLE investigators in sworn interviews that they helped him with various tasks for his work with the college, including grading coursework, checking his emails and other course-related tasks.
Carol Traynor, Valencia senior director of public relations, said in a statement Wednesday that Tobia had been placed on paid administrative while the college reviewed the allegations.
"As of yesterday, Mr. Tobia is on administrative leave with pay while we continue to review the situation," Traynor said. He would not be teaching classes while the leave is in effect, she said. Classes start Monday.
Tobia provided a portion of his notice of leave from the college to FLORIDA TODAY, which noted that the action was temporary and "not considered disciplinary in nature."
"I appreciate Valencia College's commitment to educational integrity and trust that once the College investigates the exact same information that the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the office of two State Attorneys, the results will be identical," Tobia said in a statement.
According to an FDLE report, Tobia's chief of staff told investigators she would log into Tobia's Valencia email account, helping him grade papers, set-up classes and other "follow-up issues."
"I have on occasion, if he was on a trip and he didn't have good service, he'd ask me to log into his Valencia email. If there was something important that he knew he needed to follow up on, he would ask me to check what that was, and I have assisted him in grading his papers," she said.
A legislative aide in Tobia's office said he also had helped his boss with some course-related work, including once uploading a class syllabus and helping him to cross-reference grades.
Tobia said his staffers had on occasion helped him enter grades into Valencia's online grading system, but said he had assigned all grades for his courses and no protected student information had been exposed.
Eric Rogers is a watchdog reporter for FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Rogers at 321-242-3717 or esrogers@floridatoday.com.
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Tobia put on leave from teaching job amid claims he used county staff to grade papers
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