Montgomery County police Thursday arrested a popular Rockville middle school teacher who is accused of having a sexual relationship with a 13-year-old male student for about a year.

Authorities charged Joseph Robert Ballmann, 47, of Cedarwood Drive in Rockville, with sexual abuse of a minor, third-degree sexual offense and sexual solicitation of a minor — a move that stunned community members who know Ballmann as a 2003 finalist for the county’s Teacher of the Year awards.

“This is shocking. He’s just a good guy,” said school PTA first Vice President Debbie Halevy, whose children were in Ballmann’s classes. “Kids always went to his room. ... He was very well-liked.”

According to police spokeswoman Lucille Bauer, detectives learned Tuesday that a now-15-year-old boy who had been a student of Ballmann’s was engaged in inappropriate sexual conduct with the English teacher between spring 2004 and spring 2005. The teen had apparently been in one of Ballmann’s seventh-grade classes, and their relationship reportedly continued through the student’s eighth-grade year.

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At this point, Bauer said, only one alleged victim has come forward, but police are asking anyone who has ever had inappropriate contact with the suspect to call the Family Crimes Division at 240-773-5417.

The arrest comes just a week after an incident in Silver Spring in which a middle school teacher was arrested and accused of exposing his genitals to a busload of students.

Brian Edwards, a spokesman for Montgomery County Public Schools, said school officials were extremely bothered by both cases and that Ballmann has been placed on administrative leave.

“It’s clearly disturbing when someone who is in a place of trust breaks that trust and does something like this,” he said, adding that a letter was sent home with Robert Frost students Thursday alerting them to the news of Ballmann’s charges.

Ballmann was first hired by MCPS as a bus driver in 1989. According to the school system, Ballmann held that job through 1992, at which point he worked briefly as a substitute teacher before becoming a full-time English and social studies instructor at Bethesda’s Westland Middle School. He has been at Robert Frost since 1996.

Edwards said that when Ballmann was hired he passed a full background check and has never been in trouble since.

In fact, school system bulletins show that Ballmann was hailed a number of times for his work as adviser of student publications at Westland and Robert Frost. He also designed and wrote the curriculum for a special “Contemporary Communications” course, opened a school store and has trained new seventh-grade English teachers during summer orientation.

dlevitz@dcexaminer.com