Owner Of Royal Palm Montessori In Boca Raton Accused Of Fraudulently Certifying Children As Gifted. Those Children Now Enrolled In Boca Raton Area Elementary.
What Do You Think? We Ask For Your Comments.
BY: ANDREW COLTON | Editor and Publisher
BOCA RATON, FL (BocaNewsNow.com) (Copyright © 2023 MetroDesk Media, LLC) — The owner of Royal Palm Montessori School in West Boca Raton is accused of providing fake gifted certification documents to the Palm Beach County School District. The fake documents led to multiple students being identified as “Gifted” and receiving gifted education benefits. Police arrested Royal Palm Montessori owner Dayami Rodriguez and charged her with multiple counts of fraud. She was arrested and released on $6,000 bond.
The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office was tipped to the alleged scheme by the Gifted certified instructor whose name was used on the forms. The teacher hadn’t worked for Royal Palm Montessori since 2001.
According to PBSO which investigated and arrested Dayami Rodriguez, the forms all involved students now enrolled at Sandpiper Shores Elementary School in West Boca Raton. It was not immediately clear if the students are still enrolled in gifted education programs The School District does not discuss individual students.
BocaNewsNow.com obtained the arrest report which reveals details of the investigation. We are publishing the entire arrest report through a link at the end of this story. These are highlights from affidavit of probable cause:
“The Royal Palm Montessori Academy (RPMA), located at 12532 Cobblestone Way, unincorporated Boca Raton, County of Palm Beach, Florida, 33428, is a Pre-K school which educates children from the age of two to five who have not entered kindergarten yet. This is a private education institution and is not associated with the Palm Beach County School Board (PBCSB) school system. At the beginning of each school year, the RPMA holds an open house and usually invites a psychologist to provide information to parents about the Gifted program and how to have their child evaluated. The parents themselves make arrangements to hire a psychologist to have their child evaluated. If the child scores above a 130, they are classified as gifted. The psychologist will forward the evaluation to the parents of the child as well as the school the student is zoned for. In this case, the school is Sandpiper Shores Elementary.”
“Sandpiper Shores Elementary, not knowing any of the student’s abilities, sends a Gifted Characteristics Checklist (GCC) to the RPMA for the student’s teacher to fill out. The Gifted Characteristics Checklists (GCC) are forms sent by PBCSB schools to private institutions when a public school receives registration information for a future student that has been certified as gifted by a psychologist. The receiving public school sends the private institution this checklist to get an idea of the student’s aptitude and abilities. The GCC is to be signed by a Florida Certified teacher before it can be accepted by the PBCSB. If the student’s teacher isn’t certified by the State of Florida, the form can be co-signed by a Florida Certified Teacher along with the student’s original teacher. Once completed, the private institution emails a copy of the completed form back to the PBCSB public school. In this case, between 2019 and 2022, Owner and Principal of the RPMA, Dayami Rodriguez, received 8 GCC forms for 8 students who were evaluated as gifted by a psychologist and were being registered as new students at Sandpiper Shores Elementary. Rodriguez was sent GCCs for more information on the 8 students due to their gifted evaluation. Of the 8 GCCs sent to the RPMA, 7 GCCs listed RPMA teachers along with a “Jennifer Wisnoski” and 1 GCC only listed “Jennifer Wisnoski” as the teacher. Wisnoski hasn’t worked for the RPMA since 2001.”
“On each of these 8 forms, Rodriguez fraudulently signed former employee Jennifer Wisnoski’s name as the RPMA’s certified teacher who reviewed the GCC form and agreed the student qualified for gifted services from Sandpiper Elementary School.”
“On April 22, 2022, at approximately 1124hrs, Jennifer Wisnoski called the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office to make a report of the fraudulent use of her name and employment credentials. Wisnoski stated she discovered 8 GCCs that fraudulently used her name, signature and teaching credentials. Wisnoski was made aware of the forms from Sandpiper Shores Elementary School ESOL Coordinator Renee Brandt who showed her a form with her name and signature on it from the RPMA. Wisnoski said she hasn’t worked for the RPMA for almost 10 years and didn’t authorize anyone to use her name or credentials for the forms. On May 11, 2022, a sworn interview was conducted with Wisnoski who stated, as of August of 2021, she has been employed as a teacher at Sandpiper Shores Elementary (11201 Glades Road, unincorporated Boca Raton, Florida, 33498). Wisnoski was made aware of 8 different GCCs submitted by the RPMA that listed her name, signature and teaching credentials attached to them. Wisnoski was surprised by the forms due to the fact that she hasn’t worked for the RPMA since 2010 and has since worked as a teacher in Broward County.”
Gifted education certification in Palm Beach County is big business as parents attempt to enroll their children — who may not be that bright — in gifted programs which tend to have fewer students and, frequently, better teachers. Parents of young children often speak of Psychologists and programs in Palm Beach County that help parents obtain gifted certifications for their kids, regardless of the child’s true academic ability. The Palm Beach County School District routinely removes children from the Gifted program in third grade if they are under-performing. Whether Rodriguez’s arrest is representative of a larger effort to crush the alleged pay-for-play gifted credential system in Palm Beach County is unclear. It was also not immediately clear if parents were aware of the alleged scam.
Read the complete arrest report here. What do you think about educators falsely approving children for gifted education? Share your thoughts, below.
26 responses to “BOCA RATON PRESCHOOL OWNER ARRESTED IN GIFTED STUDENT SCAM”
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Scammer! They are also so prejudiced at these Montessori in West Boca!
Probably these children parents have money! -
This sounds like a silly thing. Why would children be judged as gifted against other children. All children are gifted.
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Glad to see the “journalist” who conjured up this article is staying unbiased……. (sarcasm)
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Yes. We totally made up the police report which we provided in its entirety. Read it. Or maybe you’re not gifted enough to read.
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As the Father of two Boca elementary kids I can tell you it is well known all you have to do is pay the money. The program has been a total joke for years. In fact some people shop around to multiple people to get the proper evaluation needed. Its a pay for play.
I am one of “those parents”. I don’t “have money” as the previous idiot stated. My now 1st grader is reading at 3rd grade level thanks to the teachers at this school. Not “all children” are gifted. I would send my child again to this school!
It’s so sad to see her get arrested. She probably does not have a certified teacher on staff. One of my kid went to that school for pre-k. It was a good pre-school. She graduated from Harvard and really emphasized on education. However, there is no excuse for any scam. If none of your staff is a certified teacher, then hire someone who is certified or outsource it.
This is dishonest and potentially damaging to the child. If an average student is put into a truly gifted class, he probably will not be able to keep up. There are many ways to be gifted, but I believe we are talking about academics here.
I worked with a student at a private preschool in Boca called Beth El Learning Center and I can tell you that all they do is pay these people to label their children as gifted and most of them are not. Having a knowledgeable child and a gifted child are two very different things. But as we know money can get you just about anything
Abolish this ridiculous gifted educated certification. That will stop this scam in the future. I am sure further investigation is needed as it sounds like more participants were involved
My kid went to this preschool. Is it an amazing school with great teachers. I will still send my other kids to this preschool, my son excelled here in comparison to where my older 2 boys went. They are so hands on and great with their kids. I am shocked at this. There has to be more than is stated in this story.
I have years of experience with this school and these teachers through my own kids recent enrollment and I can honestly say that this school and its staff are brilliant and kind and very professional. I don’t believe this situation had anything to do with monetary gain, 8 kindergarten public school applications in 3 years isn’t exactly a bernie maddoff moment. My guess is that this was just an oversight or mismanagement of paperwork/documents being photocopied incorrectly etc, which is still no excuse but it’s a lot more acceptable than the words being thrown around in this article…. “scam” “scheme” those are hurtful and petty words. Also, all this happened during the covid years which was messy at best for all of us. This drama will unfortunately hurt the schools reputation, which is a shame because there are great teachers there.
What happened to innocent until proven guilty! My daughter went to this school, my son is currently enrolled in this school and my youngest daughter will go to this school when she turns 2. Hands down the best school we’ve been associated with!
My son went to this school and my other son is currently enrolled in this school , and to be honest I don’t have any issues with this academy, the matter of fact is that I’m grateful for Montessori academy the level of education is superb . Many people will judge now the Montesorri Staff for this allegation of scam , which I don’t believed if was for a financial gain , parents will do anything financially to give the best for their child , so many real crimes out there and the police goes after this Montesorri owner for allegedly fraud of a signature , really , if I have to go to court and testify how grateful I am a for this academy in regards of my children I will do it .
So many corruption in our government , so many real crimes out there , sex offenders out there and no let’s go after a person that is helping toward the education for children’s , anyways so many faults in the detective contentions ( check the report) first Jennifer says I don’t work there since 2001 the other sworn statements states I don’t work there since 2010 , at the end of the day was the harm to the kids by those allegations ?
Ar the end of the day Montesorri staff wise great and I do believe somebody it’s just been jealous at the success of the owner .
Boca news should do better and find out the reality and the facts on this case .
Palm Beach County school district receives more money for each gifted student or student with disability student than a “regular
” student. So it is a windfall for Palm Beach County School for gifted student.
The problem is the “regular”, and “ESE” student.
IQ can be wrong. It is the respectful and willingness to learn that matters the most. But no extra money for that kind of student.
The problem is “regular” students require smaller size class so they can be productive class of taxpayers.
The main criminal action is ID theft for money. If student is in the classroom and doing well than that student should stay in the program.
The psychologist evaluation is the most important legal document. I did the checklist for my two sons. My two sons became the excellent tax payers with good moral value. Both of them had the psychologist report and that was the important one.
For all the people commenting that it was not a scam, did you miss the part of the story about how the certified teacher’s signature was signed onto the forms? The teacher had not worked there for years. Are you ok with someone signing your name to official forms? Are you aware that’s a crime?
My daughter went to this school over 10 years ago and Dayami said some words to me about the future individualized education of my daughter that nobody has said before or after. I took her advice to heart and I always remember her words. Everything she said was right. I’m so glad I listened to her. There has to be more to this story. This woman is brilliant at educating children, she loves what she does. She is super hands on. She was always there every single day. She was always available to parents and treated children with kindness, and respect, plus my daughter was so academically advanced that the public school skipped her a grade. I don’t like this article cause it doesn’t tell her side of the story.
My son is enrolled. I am low income and use a voucher for his attendance. I am absolutely in awe of how amazing the staff and Ms. Rodriguez dedicate their lives to running such a brilliant school. My son has absolutely thrived since being there and the curriculum is unbeatable. These women are incredibly gifted, kind, dedicated and fantastic with children. This school is providing top notch education while creating kind and well rounded little humans. Ms. Rodriguez has my upmost respect and support. I read the police report and documents can be mishandled but I do believe there was no ill intent or greed involved in this matter. My youngest son is 1 and will most definitely be enrolled when he is old enough. Anyone who knows or has even met the entire staff as I have would know that these are some of the best teachers and educators in the district. This article is slanderous and my thoughts and prayers go to Ms. Rodriguez and her family that they persevere and continue running a great program. My son has grown leaps and bounds this year and I contribute a lot of that to these educators
Read the police report which is full on doubts , 2 years of police work to charge a person of fraud if signatures smh, a defense attorney will kill the detective reasonable doubt and Jennifer statements also , by the way that school is great , but I’m telling you read the report and that police expend two year on a waste case of signatures , no monetary gain from that school by doing that , sorry palm beach county sheriff but you guys are sorry , is real criminals out there and you guys don’t do anything productive .
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