It appears that teachers are having a difficult time keeping their political views out of classroom. Recently, an Alabama teacher was put on suspension for projecting an image of Obama with “You’re fired” after the election. Now, on the other side of the political spectrum, a Texas high school art teacher has been placed on administrative leave after video surfaced showing her “shooting” the image of President Donald Trump in a classroom while screaming, “Die!”
What is interesting is that the teacher at W.H. Adamson High School in Dallas brought this upon herself not just by using a classroom for the videotape but then posting it on her Instagram account. It was posted with the following caption: “Watching the #inauguration in my classroom like…#no #stop #denial #squirtgun #hypocrisy #powerless #saveusall #teachthembetter #atleastitsfriday.”
Voices can be heard in the background – but the school district would not say if students witnessed the teacher’s disturbing demonstration.
It was later removed but it was too late — which is itself the amazing thing about our current environment and technology. In the short time it was up, people had already copied the videotape and let it run on the Internet.
Dallas Independent School District stated:
“Today, we were made aware of a social media posting being circulated involving a teacher at W. H. Adamson High School. The teacher has been placed on administrative leave and the district has opened an investigation. This is a personnel matter and as such we cannot comment.”
I have previously written about the increasing monitoring and discipline of teachers for conduct in their private lives. These cases are different however. While the Texas teacher posted on her own social media site, she used a classroom and possibly exposed students to his deeply disturbing display. It is an appalling lesson for students to hate a president and even celebrate his assassination.
As I have previously discussed, my house is hosting over a dozen family and friends who came from around the country to join the protests today as part of the “Women’s March” in Washington. While neither my family or I joined them, I was disturbed by the level of hate and the lack of objectivity shown by some of the protesters on TV. There seems a feeling of some that they can discard notions of civility and maturity in denouncing President Trump and his Administration. I am not sure where this sense of impunity or license comes from. There is a rising level of hate and intolerance in this country that is captured by a teacher pretending to shoot a president in front of her students.
The question is what should be done with these two teachers. What do you think the appropriate response in both cases should be?