A decision has come down in the professional misconduct case involving former La Ronge, Sask. teacher Martina Cain.
Cain, who worked at Churchill Community High School, was charged with four counts of professional misconduct stemming from incidents between 1986 and 1989 by the Saskatchewan Professional Teachers Regulatory board.
The allegations included strip basketball, naked hot-tubbing and sharing a bed with a student.
READ MORE: Strip basketball, naked hot tub incident among allegations against Sask. teacher
The discipline committee in charge of the case found Cain guilty of professional misconduct for the bed sharing and allowing the strip basketball exercise to take place at team practices.
In the decision, the Discipline Committee for the Saskatchewan Professional Teachers Regulatory Board (SPTRB), said from 1986 to 1989, Cain allowed a student to sleep over at her private residence in Cain’s personal bed on average once every two months.
According to the decision, Cain was the student’s basketball coach and the student’s family attended the same church as Cain. The student saw Cain as “a mentor and to some extent, a friend.”
The student’s parents asked Cain to look after the student while the student’s sibling went to medical appointments. This included overnight stays. At the time, Cain’s basement suite included one main bedroom with a double bed and an unfurnished spare bedroom. The student declined to sleep in the unfurnished bedroom and slept on the bed.
The committee said Cain did not ask the student to bring a sleeping bag with her or find out if another bed was brought in.
“Neither Ms. Cain nor Student A told anyone what the sleeping arrangements were. Student A did not tell her parents as she did not believe they would let her sleep over and as it could affect her standing on the basketball team. Ms. Cain stated that she did not tell anyone as she did not think there was anything wrong with the sleeping arrangements at the time and she did not believe it was a boundary violation at the time,” the discipline committee wrote.
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The decision said no one else was in the suite during the overnight stays, the student and Cain were clothes at all times and there was no physical contact. There was also no inappropriate conversation, discussion or offering of any alcohol or illicit drugs.
The committee found that although Cain did not have malicious intent, sharing a bed on multiple occasions served to further the student’s “perception of friendship.” The committee said this compromised and confused the student-teacher relationship and was a boundary violation.
According to discipline committee, the charge involving the strip-basketball exercise between 1987 and 1988 when Cain asked the same student and other students on the female basketball team practice shooting hoops by playing strip basketball. The committee said Cain would ask students to remove a piece of clothing if they missed a hoop.
According to the student, she did not tell her parents or anyone else about the drill because she would not have been able to play basketball if she had.
The student said the “strip” version of the drill only occurred once and she recalled one of the other players being “red-faced” and “pulling her shirt down to cover her upper legs.”
Another student’s testified that she did not tell her own parents about the drill as she expected they would be very angry and she recalled “sitting on the floor, removing one of her socks, and being worried about what she would remove next.”
She also said the person with the least clothes ended up in a T-shirt and underwear.
The third student said she ended up in a bra and blue shorts. She did not tell her parents as she was worried the basketball program would have been shut down.
She also remembered one of the players taking her shorts, off, turning red and pulling down her shirt to cover her thighs.
The fourth student she recalled the strip-drilling incident only occurred once. She removed her shoes, socks, shorts and bra, but left her shirt and underwear on.
The discipline committee said the students involved were “humiliated and/or embarrassed to some extent by what occurred.” However, during the incident that went beyond the removal of socks and shoes, the evidence did not establish that Ms. Cain was there.
READ MORE: Former Sask. teacher disputes allegations of naked hot-tubbing and strip basketball with students
However, the committee said Cain is responsible for introducing the drill where articles of clothing were removed and she was responsible for what occurred during the practices as both a coach and teacher.
“Ms. Cain failed to adequately supervise the students and failed to restrict the rules of the drill,” the committee said in the decision.
The naked hot-tubbing allegation was dropped as there was not enough poof and different recollections. For example, the student said she was initially wearing a bathing suit, Cain then asked why she was wearing it and the student removed her bathing suit. Cain denied being naked in the hot tub with that student or anyone else.
Cain’s teaching certificate has been suspended for six months. She is also required to pay $5,000.
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