In an attempt to keep potential sex offenders from coming into contact with children at the University Child Care and Development Centers, the University will soon require background checks on anyone wanting to work with children at the sites, including parents.
The new precautions are a result of concerns that arose after Stephen Dale Jackson, 31, charged with aggravated incest in Louisiana, was allowed into both the Moss Street Children’s Center and the Westmoreland Children’s Center to take pictures of the children last November. Jackson was the partner of an enrolled child’s parent at the time the photographs were taken, Reynolds said.
University officials met with parents in February to propose possible changes in volunteer policies and practices, Vice President for Student Affairs Anne Leavitt said.
CCDC Coordinator Dennis Reynolds said the changes in policy are expected to be implemented by fall 2005, but first the University’s legal council needs to give them final review.
A mandatory background check is already a statutory requirement for anyone who wants to work as a regular employee, Reynolds said, adding that the University’s new policy is in line with policies at
public schools.
The additional background checks will not have a significant financial impact or cause any extra hassle, Reynolds said.
Nancy deRonde, director of the child-care centers at Oregon State University, told the Emerald in January that criminal
background checks are a regular part of the hiring process for the OSU centers and are required for anyone coming into contact with children.
Student employee Allison Dworschak said, “I was really impressed that even though we had no reason to believe he would hurt anyone, no kid was left alone with him.” She added that it would have been difficult for him to harm any child “because of the way things are handled here on a daily basis.”
Reynolds said when the CCDC first heard about Jackson’s possible criminal past through the “parent grapevine,” it was the CCDC that called the Eugene Police Department, not the other way around, as he feels the media may have portrayed.
“Once burned, twice cautious,” Reynolds said. “We try to balance kids’ safety and security with being open and welcoming.” Now the scale has to be tipped toward safety, he said. “Keeping kids safe is what we do.”
Reynolds said the CCDC sends in hundreds of background checks every year and “in the 18 years I’ve been coordinator, only three or four have come back with a record and they were typically drug charges.”
Reynolds said he feels the parents gave the CCDC their “vote of confidence” when only two families out of more than 200 didn’t re-enroll their kids, citing the incident with Jackson. One of those two families wanted to come back after only one month had passed, he added.

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