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The Pinellas School Board agreed Tuesday to pay $131,500 to a former elementary school teacher who successfully defended himself on charges that he sexually abused two second-graders.

The board will pay Mark C. Fronczak a portion of the legal fees he incurred in his 2005 criminal trial, where he faced charges of capital sexual battery and lewd and lascivious molestation of two children at Southern Oak Elementary School. In exchange, Fronczak will waive his right to appeal the board's decision to fire him and will agree not to apply for future employment in the district.

Being a male elementary school teacher sometimes carries with it the added responsibility of being a male role model. "For a lot of kids, I'm the only male they interact with on the daily basis," said Ken Hamerlinck, first-grade teacher at Sheridan Elementary School, Bloomington. "You owe it to them to be a good role model."

Boosting the number of male teachers in school would have little impact on boys' attitudes towards education or their academic results, a report says today.

Only one in eight primary teachers is a man and the figure for nurseries is smaller at one in eleven, but the idea boys would do better if they had more male role models in the classroom is misguided, say contributors to the report Boys to Men.

WAUKESHA - Ben Miles is a rarity, but he doesn’t mind. In fact, he said he likes it a lot.

Why is Miles a rarity? He’s a man teaching in the early elementary school grades.

He’s even more of a rarity because he’s a kindergarten teacher, now as a long-term substitute at Saratoga Elementary School.

Jim Smallwood and Bill Hardin are rarities.

The two men, both social studies teachers at Byram Middle School, are the only male instructors many of their students have ever had.

They're in short supply nationwide, but even more so in Mississippi. New 2005 data compiled by the National Education Association show Mississippi has the lowest percentage of male teachers in the country.

Here's a link to a math teacher. You can read about his first year.

How will his second year go?

Find out by reading his blog.

MenTeach has been in correspondence with an organization helping people get their teacher certification. Here's what they've told me:

Earn Your Passport to Teaching

A Respected, Efficient and Cost Effective Route to Becoming a Fully Certified Teacher

Lowly status, poor pay, and fear of lawsuits are pushing the numbers of male teachers in US classrooms to an all-time low.