A special education teacher’s aide in Michigan has been arrested for having “sexual relations” with three separate students.

37-year-old Amy Rita Ellsworth has been accused of having sexual relations with three different students at Waterford Mott High School in Waterford, MI.  She was charged this past Thursday with six counts of criminal sexual conduct with students.  These include two 15-year felony counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct and four life felony counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct.

In short, if convicted, she is facing life in prison.

There was no listing of what evidence was discovered against Ms. Ellsworth in any of the numerous reports on the case.  The only fact that was repeated was that it was with three separate students both on and off school grounds.  She also was not an instructor, but just an aide, something they are going to great lengths to stress.

The problem for the school district is that this is the second employee brought up on sex charges in two weeks.  The earlier one was Brian C. Drake, the district’s theater coordinator, was charged with three counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct with a student. He is accused of having sex with a female senior during the 2008-2009 in the Waterford Kettering High theater.

Each of Mr. Drake’s felony charges carry a 15-year sentence if convicted.

The Waterford police are said to have begun investing Mr. Drake in September and Ms. Ellsworth in October.

There is something to be said that this problem of school employees having sex with students when it is so out of control that your district has not one, but two investigations going on at the same time.  While I’m sure the two stories are in no way connected, it is just unnerving that the odds of this happening have increased to such a degree that this is even possible.

So glad I don’t have any kids in school.

These two now join the roll call of teacher sex scandals for 2009!

• Christine McCallum, Boston, MA
• Lisa Lavoie, Holyoke, MA
• Christy Lynn Martin, St. Petersburg, FL
• Linda Nef and Valynne Bowers, Bountiful, UT
• Sarah L. Tolzien, Richton Park, IL
• Autumn Faulkner, Randolph County, WV
• Lindsay Massaro, Hackettstown, NJ
• Lauren Breslin, Vineland, NJ
• Kristina Anna Baeta, Union City, CA
• Raeanna Jewell, Apache Junction, AZ
• Jennifer Lea Burton, Orangefield, TX
• Tamara Hofmann, Chandler, AZ
• Jennifer Marie Collier, Jacksonville, FL
• Gina Marie Watring, Durham, NC
• Alison M. Peck, Greenfield, MO
• Maria Guman Hernandez, Hialeah, FL
• Helen Goddard, London, UK
• Alini Brito & Cindy Mauro, Brooklyn, NY (no students involved)
• Amanda Watkins, Muscle Shoals, AL