A news item on Saturday reported that the Dallas Independent School District (DISD) is being investigated bythe Social Security Administration (SSA) for assigning bogus social security numbers to employees hired from foreign countries. Apparently this started as someones bright idea for expediting the hiring system.
The new hires needed something for identificaion purposes to get on the payroll. So this “someone” decided they could use the fake SS numbers as temporary identification numbers until they received real ones. When new numbers were assigned by the SSA, the employees were supposed to tell officials at DISD so the fake SS numbers could be replaced.
That didn’t always go according to the plan. In some cases, the fake numbers made their way to retirement accounts, the IRS, and the Social Security Administration. And some of the numbers were ones already legitimately assigned to other people. The legal department of the DISD is looking into the matter as well
I read this news story several time, trying to figure out how someone could not recognize from the get-go that this was a stupid idea. Not to mention a criminal idea. Falsifying Social Security information is a felony.
DISD is already under heavy scrutiny for budget shortfalls, attempting to solve that problem by firing a number of teachers, and other questionable operations. They sure didn’t need another problem because the solutions to the problems always seem to impact the students and teachers most profoundly.
Those creating the problems continue to hold their jobs and receive large salaries and bonuses, while teachers struggle to make ends meet and students struggle to learn in an environment that becomes less conducive to learning every day.
And unfortunately, these are not problems unique to just one school district.