Two Aiken County Public School District teachers placed on administrative leave resign from their position

Bianca Moorman, Aiken Standard, S.C.
·2 min read

May 25—Two Aiken County Public District teachers who were placed on administrative leave during the 2022-23 school year have resigned from their positions.

Thomas Russ Schneider, 49, of Grovetown, Georgia, and Raquel Stevens, 35, of North Augusta have both resigned from their teaching positions according to Merry Glenne Piccolino, director of communications and community partnerships with Aiken County Public School District.

Schneider and Stevens were facing criminal charges while they were employed with the district.

Schneider, who was a first-year teacher at Langley-Bath-Clearwater Middle School, was arrested at the school Sept. 2, 2022 and was charged with first-degree forgery by the Richmond County Sheriff's Office for submitting a false drug test, the Aiken Standard reported.

Schneider previously taught in Augusta, served as football coach and athletic director at Fox Creek High School and was a football coach at McCormick High School.

He resigned from his position in 2014 from Fox Creek to focus on his family and his health.

He has been teaching social studies for 21 years.

Stevens was arrested and charged Jan. 11 for possession of anabolic steroids of 100 doses or more, possession of Fentanyl, violation of drug distribution law, possession with the intent to distribute a controlled substance near a school and unlawful neglect of a child, according to jail records.

She was arrested after a teen was found naked and beaten in Aiken on Jan. 7. Stevens, Patrick Omar Stevens, 36 of North Augusta; Derrick Lydale Nixon, 32; and Rickey Drayton, 62, of Aiken were also arrested and charged.

Stevens was a middle school math teacher at Leavelle McCampbell Middle School.

She had been previously arrested in 2018 for leaving her 2-year old child in a car while she was teaching at North Augusta Middle School.

She was placed on administrative leave and the incident was investigated by law enforcement and the South Carolina Board of Education considered her certification and its status.

Her teaching certificate was reinstated and the charges were removed in July 2019.

According to records from the board, her teacher's license was summarily suspended March 8 and will remain suspended until a due process hearing is held.

Schnieder and Stevens were both placed on administrative leave before their resignations.