An Iowa substitute teacher was fired for pressuring high schoolers to help fund her “medical mission” to Ecuador in exchange for extra credit.
Stephanie Mullaley, a full-time, long-term substitute, was canned from her post at Clinton Community School District on May 29 for allegedly violating the school district’s ethics policy, the Iowa Capital Dispatch reported Tuesday.
Mullaley is accused of offering her students extra credit points if they donated money to her personal GoFundMe account, which was created to send her and her husband, Nick, to Ecuador in July.
“(She) promised high school students in her class that they would receive extra credit toward their grade in her class if they donated to her GoFundMe account. Students felt pressured to donate money to her personal GoFundMe page,” Administrative Law Judge Duane Golden found, according to the outlet.
Mullaley set a $1,800 target goal on the crowdsourcing page, but received a measly $140 from six donations ranging from $5 to $50, the outlet reported.
The fired educator said she and her husband had been invited to go on the South American trip but needed financial support from friends and family, according to the since-deleted fundraiser.
“Nick & I are embarking on a journey this summer with a medical mission group,” Mullaley wrote on a Facebook post alongside the link to the defunct fundraiser. “This was only a thought a year ago, and it became real when we got an official invitation end of 2025.
“Feels like a blessing to have an opportunity to serve a community in need of medical service and utilize my skills and serve. God put this in place for us, and we’re answering it,” she wrote. “Hope to have your support, and if you can’t financially, we understand and just keep us in your prayers.”
Mullaley pleaded with her students that the experience would “pay for her education” because it was a “unique opportunity to travel to Ecuador” where she would be interpreting the mission trip.
“Helping bridge language barriers so that care and compassion can reach those who need it most,” and that her husband would be “assisting the team in any way he can,” Mullaley wrote, according to the outlet.
The fundraised money allegedly would have been used to cover transportation, food and hotels.
Golden denied the ex-teacher unemployment benefits after it came to light she had pushed her students to give money.
The judge found that Mullaley had demonstrated a “willful or wanton disregard” of her employer’s interests, declaring her conduct made her ineligible for the benefits, the outlet reported.
