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    School Reform Can Be Murder
    School Reform Can Be Murder
    School Reform Can Be Murder
    Ebook80 pages1 hour

    School Reform Can Be Murder

    By Saundra McKee

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    About this ebook

    Connie Wilson, an attractive and brilliant college professor with a mysterious past, is found murdered in her isolated cottage. Close colleague and amateur sleuth, Lucy Crawford, is determined to bring Connie's killer to justice. Lucy follows a trail of clues that expose Connie's controversial views on school reform and other social issues. Soon a cloud of suspicion surrounds Connie's colleagues, dean, state legislator and the local school board president. Lucy finds her own life in danger as she gets closer to exposing the murderer.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSaundra McKee
    Release dateApr 21, 2011
    ISBN9781458151926
    School Reform Can Be Murder
    Author

    Saundra McKee

    I am a retired educator. I taught in the public schools for 15 years and at the university level for 22 years. I love to travel the world. I enjoy politics, dogs, mysteries and water sports. I am a lay speaker in the United Methodist Church.

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      Book preview

      School Reform Can Be Murder - Saundra McKee

      School Reform Can Be Murder

      by Sandy McKee

      All characters and events in this story are fictional. Any resemblance to anyone living or dead is purely coincidental. While some of the places mentioned actually exist, they are used in an entirely fictional manner.

      Published by Saundra McKee at Smashwords. Copyright 2011. Saundra McKee.

      Chapter 1

      Monday

      I got word of Connie Wilson’s death as I was leaving my final class of the day. One of my closest colleagues and department chair, Rick Roswell, was going through the halls spreading the word to any faculty member he spotted. We’re going to have a quick faculty meeting at four. I’ll give you the details then.

      I glanced at my hot pink wristwatch, noting that I had twenty minutes until the meeting and still amused that at fifty seven I still tried to match my outfits and jewelry for my student’s approval. I much preferred sweatshirts, t-shirts or blue jeans, but being in teacher education, I try to be a role model of professionalism. Most of my students were seniors and soon to be student teaching and then entering the job market.

      I carried all my teaching materials back to my roomy but messy office, grabbed a cold bottle of water from my small refrigerator and decided to check my email. As usual there were several questions from students who hadn’t paid close attention to an assignment and wanted me to reiterate it for them in detail. That was about as much fun as driving on black ice, so I chose to point them to the written explanation in their syllabus or my Black Board site or invited them to stop by the office during office hours for a chat. After thirty seven years in the classroom, my retirement was on the horizon, and I wasn’t working nearly as hard as I once had. I’d been tenured and a full professor for many years and no longer felt any pressure to be a star. I preferred to put my energy into mentoring students and younger faculty members who actually gave a damn. Unfortunately, Connie Wilson was one of them.

      I’d chaired the search committee that had brought Connie to our department five years ago. She was thirty-eight years old, divorced with no children, and specialized in Children’s Literature. She was born in Florida and had taught in the public schools and a university in Southern Florida before coming to our small state university in Pennsylvania. She was attractive, dynamic, and had a good record of teaching, service and scholarship. She had written two children’s books that had both enjoyed some commercial success. Since arriving, she was popular with her students, a hard worker in the department and friendly and not pretentious. Connie and I had met weekly for coffee and I’d try to help her navigate her way to tenure and promotion. While outgoing and congenial when talking about her teaching, she remained fairly quiet about her private life. That suited me fine, having many students who loved to tell me every aspect of their personal problems in hopes that it might raise their grade or get them out of an assignment. I wasn’t really able to process the fact that Connie was no longer with us. It just wasn’t real to me yet. I expected to see her tapping on my door any minute.

      At four p.m. the dozen members of our department began wandering into the conference room. Very little goes on from day to day on our campus, certainly not death. Everyone was talking nervously to each other awaiting word from our fearless leader, Rick. Rick stepped in exactly at four. Rick was fifty, tall, thin and distinguished looking. His wife was an instructor in the psychology department. Rick was a skilled mediator and could keep most faculty focused and contributing. He made working in the department enjoyable with his warm sense of humor and ability to make everyone feel that they were really valued for their contributions. He also ran interference with administrators like the deans and provost. In short, we all trusted Rick and seldom questioned what he asked of us.

      Well most of you know why I called this meeting with such short notice. When Connie didn’t report for her twelve o’clock class today, I tried to call both her cell and home number. When I didn’t get an answer and she hadn’t showed up by 12:30, I really got concerned. Rather than call 911, I decided to take a drive out by her place. She has a small cottage that she rents out near the state game lands. To make a long story short, I got there, saw her car in the driveway and the door hanging open. I walked in and saw Connie lying on the living room floor. There was a lot of blood. My guess is that she’d fallen and hit or head or been hit over the head with something. I checked for a pulse with one hand while calling 911 with the other. I waited for the EMTs and police to arrive and have spent a good part of the afternoon answering their questions and trying to locate some next of kin for Connie. There have been no arrangements made yet. I just wanted you to hear this from me. The police are pretty certain that Connie was murdered. The house was broken into and things were missing. You know what the rumor mill is like. Students will no doubt have a lot of questions, and we need to be as compassionate with them as possible. As hard as this hits us, it could impact her students even more.

      Everyone looked stunned. I couldn’t recall a murder on the campus of Matriculata University or our small town of Matriculate in the twenty years that I’d lived there. I’d been out to Connie’s place once to help her move in and knew that it was pretty isolated with no neighbors in sight. At the time I wondered why she’d chosen to live far removed from any neighbors, but assumed that the price was right and knew that few decent rentals are available in most small college towns for faculty.

      Someone asked Rick if any family had been located. Rick replied that they’d reached an aunt in the Fort Myers area. He asked our group if we knew of any additional family. I

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