If you haven't seen it yet, here's a story in the Beaumont Enterprise.
The gist of the story is this: a high school history teacher with six years in the district and a second year principal was having a classroom discussion where the students were encouraged to express opinions and debate positions. One girl became upset about something that was said, walked out and complained to the principal. The girl's other came in later and also complained that the teacher allowed the students to talk about things too freely. Then several more parents met together with the principal and said the same thing, and by the way, one of the parents thought the teacher was an atheist and just too liberal.
Th parents then went to a school board meeting and said the same thing in the open comments period, after which the teacher was put on administrative leave. While on leave, teacher responded to a text message from a student and district then proposed to terminate him for having contact with a student while on adminstrative leave.
Teacher resigned.
It's a scary situation for a teacher, and he is not the first one to find himself in this landslide of riot mentality. Teacher says the principal he was being suspended because he was suspected of being an atheist. Later written suspension blamed it on texting with a student while he was suspended - which of course happened after the original suspension, and anyway teacher said he was never told not to talk to students.
The whole thing smells, of course. I always caution that there may be more to the story than we're hearing, but the things I have heard about this one - from a variety of sources - make me suspect that what happened was a teacher who some parents were uncomfortable with because he encouraged the kids to think outside the box of their small town got swept away in a moment of opportunity seized by the principal and school board - all of whom failed to put their thinking caps on and realize this was wrong.
If the teacher had chosen to fight, I believe he would have had a strong defense and likely be put back in the classroom.
I have been a target like this - small-town East Texas is the most political, close-minded, mean-spirited people I have ever seen. Who would want to fight to go back into a classroom in a community like this? Teachers have no rights. Discussions about moral, spiritual, or political issues can't happen in schools like this. They deserve to remain in their mind traps. They're all related by DNA anyway.
Posted by: Ridiculous | July 21, 2009 at 07:40 AM