Kammeyer v. Board of Education

393 S.W.2d 122, 1965 Mo. App. LEXIS 622
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedJune 15, 1965
Docket31614
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 393 S.W.2d 122 (Kammeyer v. Board of Education) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kammeyer v. Board of Education, 393 S.W.2d 122, 1965 Mo. App. LEXIS 622 (Mo. Ct. App. 1965).

Opinion

RUDDY, Presiding Judge.

This is a proceeding brought under the Workmen’s Compensation Act. The Circuit Court affirmed an award of the Industrial Commission denying compensation to employee.

The employee, an elementary school teacher, while walking from her automobile to the Froebel School on the evening of March 17, 1960, to attend an “open house” meeting scheduled at the school, slipped on snow and ice and fell and was injured.

The St. Louis Teachers Union Local 420, American Federation of Teachers, was granted leave by the Circuit Court of the City of St. Louis and by this court to intervene as Amicus Curiae in these proceedings.

*124 The sole question is whether the accident causing employee’s injury arose out of and in the course of her employment as a school teacher.

In her claim she alleged that she slipped on an accumulation of ice and snow while on the school premises. The Industrial Commission when making the award denying employee’s claim made the following findings and conclusions:

“The Commission finds from all the evidence that the accident suffered by employee did not arise out of and in the course of her employment. In reaching this ultimate finding, the Commission finds that employee slipped and fell upon the ice on the public sidewalk along the east side of Pennsylvania Avenue adjacent to the grounds of the Froebel School at a point approximately twenty feet south of what is referred to in the evidence as ‘the second gate into the school yard’ at a time when she was going to her work in said school; and that, since said accident did not occur upon employer’s premises, same is not compensable.
“The Commission further finds that the work that employee was, at the time of the accident going to perform, was a part of her regular duties as a teacher.”

Employee in her brief “concedes that the finding of fact made by the Industrial Commission on the disputed and controverted issue of where the appellant fell, to-wit, ‘ * * * upon the ice on the public sidewalk along the east side of Pennsylvania Avenue adjacent to the grounds of the Froebel School, and that said accident did not occur upon the employer’s premises’ is supported by substantial evidence and is conclusive and binding upon appellant (employee) and the St. Louis Court of Appeals in determining this appeal.”

Supplementing employee’s concession, we add that we have examined the evidence and find that this finding made by the Commission is supported by substantial and competent evidence. Employee in her points relied on confines her attack to the finding made by the Commission, “that the work that employee was, at the time of the accident, going to perform was a part of her regular duties as a teacher.” Our summation of the evidence before the Industrial Commission will be confined to such evidence as pertains to this finding of the Industrial Commission challenged by the employee.

Employee was a teacher employed by the Board of Education of the City of St. Louis since 1942. For approximately one year prior to her fall she had taught a class of mentally retarded children at the Froebel Elementary School. Her immediate superior was Miss Lucille Berkel who was principal of the school. Her teaching hours at the school were from 8:30 A.M. to 3:30 P. M. daily, but she usually got to the school about 8:15 A.M. because on certain days she had yard duty. On the day of her fall she had yard duty and had to report at the school at 8:15 A.M. and also supervised play in the yard during morning and afternoon recesses on that day.

William Kottmeyer, Deputy Superintendent of Instruction in the school system, said that the teacher is directed to be ready and prepared for teaching at 8:30 A.M. but that the precise limits are not confined “in clock hours.”

In addition to her regular classroom duties employee was required to attend meetings held after 3:30 P.M., with other teachers of the school when called by the principal of the school. She said these meetings would be called “every few weeks.” It was a practice for many years in the public school system of the City of St. Louis to hold “open house” meetings and this was a customary part of the operation of the schools in the city. The primary purpose of these meetings was to invite the parents of the children to meet with the respective teachers of their children to enable the teacher to personally discuss with the parents the conduct of their children, their *125 progress and type of work they were doing. It was also the function and duty of each individual teacher at the open house meeting to discuss with the parents of the children they were teaching in their classrooms the problems confronting the children. These meetings were held during the day occasionally, but most frequently in the evening hours. The employer, Board of Education, did not furnish transportation to and from the school for the teachers and the employer in no way attempted to control the means and methods of the teachers going to and coming from school. It was the teacher’s own responsibility as to how she would travel between her home and the school. There were no activities in connection with the open house meetings to be performed by the teacher outside of the school building itself.

Whenever a school bond issue or tax increase was submitted to the voters for approval at an election, the Superintendent of Education would time the open house meeting in each school for a date close to the eve of the election in order to use the meeting as a means of publicizing the need for approval of the school bond issue or a tax increase or both. This had been a practice of the Board of Education for many years. A bond issue proposal and a tax increase proposal on behalf of the Board of Education had been submitted to the voters of the City of St. Louis a number of times prior to March 22nd, 1960, and had failed to get the voters’ approval. These matters were resubmitted to the voters for approval on March 22, 1960. The Board of Education and the administrative officials of the public school system regarded approval of the bond issue and tax increase as a “must” and said that failure would create a desperate and critical situation. A systematic campaign by the Board of Education and its administrative people was conducted, and included in the campaign was the distribution of informative literature to the parents of the children attending the schools. One of the measures used in the campaign was a directive to all schools to hold an open house meeting, at which meeting, in addition to the parent-teacher communication as heretofore stated, the principals of the schools were directed to and did show a film at each of the elementary schools and made an explanation to the parents of the public school needs. The principals were directed to have the teachers urge the children to have their parents attend this meeting which consisted of two parts. Initially, the parents were shown a film by the principal of the school publicizing the coming election. Thereafter, the parents were directed by the principal to go to the room in which their children were housed and to discuss with the teacher the matters heretofore stated.

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Bluebook (online)
393 S.W.2d 122, 1965 Mo. App. LEXIS 622, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kammeyer-v-board-of-education-moctapp-1965.