Denied for Certification of Eligibility & Becoming a Teacher

[GeeRawkz]

I recently received in the mail from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement a letter stating that I have been denied for Certification of Eligibility in accordance with sections 943.0585 or 943.059 Florida Statues. The fingerprint card submitted with my application has been identified with a record in the Department's criminal history files as a result of the following 2 offenses:

No Driver License in Miami Dade / Florida on 11/28/2004 & a DUI in North Carolina on 10/12/2006. For the first offense, there was a plea entered of NOLO CONTENDERE with a disposition of WITHHOLD ADJDCTN. For the DUI offense in North Carolina I am unfortunately unable to search for this offense online so I am unsure of the exact plea and disposition filed.

I have been going to school to become a teacher in early childhood development / speech pathology. Naturally when I received this letter, I got into a state of panic not knowing what to do next. Does anyone have any advice on what I should do?!? The last thing I want to happen is these offenses that took place about 8 years and about 6 years ago respectively to ruin my future teaching career!

Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thank you in advance!

 

[disagreeable]

What do you want us to say? You received a DUI and they don't want people with records of social irresponsibility working for them apparently.

 

[GeeRawkz]

It was a simple question seeing if anyone had any advice, whether to try to go the expungement route or maybe this incident happened to someone else and has experience in what can be done. To my knowledge and understanding depending on the type of plea and disposition of the case itself, amount of time having passed since this incident (which would be just about 6 years in this case) with no further incidents, the state the offense took place in all weigh heavily on how to proceed. I truly can't imagine there is nothing to be done as it seems your response is suggesting. But thank you for taking the time to respond.

 

[disagreeable]

http://law.justia.com/codes/north-carolina/2005/chapter_15a/chapter_15a.html

Here are NC laws. You do not appear to be eligible for expungement, unless you were under 18 when this occurred.

 

[mightymoose]

Look here...

http://www.fldoe.org/edstandards/background_screening.asp

It appears to me your offenses are not automatically disqualifying. Apparently a hit on fingerprints causes the application to be reviewed by a committee to determine what action to take. Do you know if that review was already done?
Contact the state Department of Education to see where you stand.

 

[army judge]

The no driver license is likely to be inconsequential.
In fact, why were you fingerprinted for a traffic offense?
Were you charged and convicted of a crime OTHER than no drivers license during that arrest?
The DUI, if it were expunged, would take months to dispose of, even if you could do so.