We recently discussed a Vermont principal who was told that she would have to retire after expressing her opinion of Black Lives Matter on her personal Facebook page. Now, a popular social studies teacher and baseball coach at Walled Lake Western High School in Michigan has been fired after tweeting his support for President Donald Trump and reopening the schools. For free speech advocates, the firing of Justin Kucera, 28, raises concerns that he might be another teacher terminated for expressing unpopular views outside of the school. The District denies that it fired Kucera over his support for Trump but that means that someone is lying: either Kucera or the District. For his part, Kucera said that it was the tweets that were raised by the District, not some other ground for termination.
Kucera was called into a Zoom meeting after three tweets. In the first tweet, he retweeted the President saying “SCHOOLS MUST OPEN IN THE FALL!!!” He also tweeted: “I’m done being silent. @realDonaldTrump is our president … Don’t @ me.” When someone responded to that tweet, Kucera responded “Liberals suck man.” He later deleted that last tweet.
A few days later, he was called in for a meeting with Michael Lonze, assistant superintendent of human resources for Walled Lake Consolidate Schools and Bradley Paddock, executive manager for human resources, as well as two union representatives. He was questioned about his tweets and later told that he must resign or be fired.
As is often the case on the blog, I am not interested in the merits of these views. Indeed, we have often defended teachers who have expressed anti-Trump views. Kucera supports the President and wants schools open. He also insulted liberals and then deleted that insult. The question is whether a teacher should be allowed to participate in expressing such political views.
Expressing anti-Trump or anti-conservative views do not seem a problem in most schools. Indeed, my own school of George Washington is under fire for recommending that incoming students to read a book entitled Conservatism and Racism, and Why in America They Are the Same. Imagine if you are a conservative student coming to GW and that is the book that the school wants you and others to read. When confronted on this recommendation, George Washington University did not send out an apology to all conservative students or include a book criticizing all liberals. It did not send out an apology to the small minority of conservative faculty at the school to assure them that it does not consider them de facto racists.
Conservative critics have noted that Walled Lake teachers have assigned articles on such topics as “how to beat Trump.” That was not on personal social media but in the classroom. Likewise, a kindergarten teacher in the district, reportedly called Trump a “sociopath” and a “narcissist” on Facebook in 2016 but was not fired. I would not want either teacher fired. The question is why Kucera is not accorded the same freedom of expression.
This brings us back to the denial. The district has basically called Kucera a liar. It is quoted as saying “no disciplinary action was taken as a result of any support of President Trump.” It then refused to address the reasons for the termination. It did make the following rather opaque additional comment: “When issues arise there’s a temptation to view items through the lens of our fractured political discourse. Walled Lake encourages students and staff members to engage each other with mutual respect and civility.”
There is obviously a public concern that this action occurred so soon after these tweets. It would be useful for the District to state categorically that it did not raise the tweets as a purpose of this meeting. It could also address whether it accepts that teachers are allowed to engage in political speech. While Kucera went too far in the tweet on liberals, he deleted it.
Since Kucera has already spoken publicly about the reasons for his termination, he should not release the district from any confidentiality obligation on the cause for this termination. Again, someone is lying or shading the truth. If the tweets were raised in the meeting, the District should have (at a minimum) admitted that they were part of the reason that he was pulled into the meeting. If he was fired for the tweets, he should be reinstated and others reviewed for discipline for not only curtailing free speech but lying about the controversy to the public.
This is a major concern for families if the District is applying a content-based discriminatory policy on speech. It is also a major concern if they have been lied to by either the teacher or the Administrators. It should not be difficult to find out who if Kucera will waive confidentiality or seek a written explanation for termination.
Close the Department of Education – education is local.
Military personnel are the first “workforce” of every nation – military personnel will never be members of a union.
Local public education personnel must never be members of a union and local districts must never negotiate with any union.
“Liberals,” actually progressives, DO SUCK!!! Their goal is to overthrow the government and establish a progressive utopia.
JT said “Walled Lake teachers have assigned articles on such topics as “how to beat Trump.” That was not on personal social media but in the classroom.” This is concerning. Parents should really look into what teachers are teaching and books and homework being assigned. What an inappropriate subject to teach children. I’m not a Biden fan, but wouldn’t want a “how to beat Biden” assignment to be assigned either. Politics doesn’t belong in classrooms except political science and even then, both sides need to be addressed with teachers staying out of pushing agendas.
my own school of George Washington is under fire for recommending that incoming students to read a book entitled Conservatism and Racism, and Why in America They Are the Same.
Are they under fire from you? Let us know what efforts you are doing to combat this at your own school.
Olly,
Don’t hold your breath on this one.
Agreed Jim.
“Palatine-Schaumburg High School District 211 (Illinois) board members Thursday voted 5-2 to fire a tenured Palatine High School social studies teacher who had been investigated for a controversial Facebook post just “after” the end of the school year about Black Lives Matter protests. In early June District 211 officials started investigating the since-deleted Facebook post about the protests that followed the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The investigation began after screenshots of what purported to be the teacher’s remarks were shared on social media. “The statements in the post do not reflect the values or principles of District 211,” the district said in a statement at the time, without further describing the post. “We are truly sorry for any harm or disrespect that this may have caused.”
https://www.dailyherald.com/news/20200716/district-211-fires-palatine-high-school-teacher-over-controversial-facebook-post
This is statement she is alleged to have made on her private account to her personal followers when school was not in session. A portion of the social media post stated, “I find the term ‘white privilege’ as racist as the ‘N’ word. You have not walked in my shoes either so do not make assumptions about me and my so called privilege. You think America is racist? Then you have been hoodwinked by the white liberal establishment and race baiters like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.”
Many students during the course of this investigation had really positive things to say about this teacher and the respect she gave all opinions in discussions with them.
A few days later, he was called in for a meeting with Michael Lonze, assistant superintendent of human resources for Walled Lake Consolidate Schools and Bradley Paddock, executive manager for human resources, as well as two union representatives. He was questioned about his tweets and later told that he must resign or be fired.
1. I have little doubt the bureaucratic microbes are lying. If they’re not, let’s see an explanation. People of character are an odd accident in the world of school administration.
2. The list of officialdom noted here is absurd. In a sensibly run organization, the HR apparat employs grievance officers (who in school systems, should be itinerant), acts as the liaison to the EAP program, supervises benefits programs and acts as a repository of information and counseling about them, acts as an intake pipe for job applications, is the repository for confidential personnel records, handles collective bargaining negotiations, designs classification and compensation schemes, designs evaluation forms and matrices, monitors (with the assistance of outside consultants) the actuarial soundness of benefit programs, and, in conjunction with the counsel’s office, assembles circulars on compliance with state and federal labor law. Under no circumstances does it hire, promote, demote, discipline, or discharge employees (though it may warn supervisors about certain proposed acts). HR is staff, not line.
3. In a school system, many of those HR functions will be performed by the state education department or the state personnel apparat. In a properly run school system, the superintendant’s office prepares the current budget, evaluates facilities and assembles the capital budget and proposals for bond issues, employs the comptroller corps (who are generally deployed at each school), employs the motor pool, employs itinerant faculty, employs itinerant staff, and acts as a liaison to the sheriff’s department and to co-operative program boards, conducts performance audits of each school, and appoints the school principal. The office also performs some of the HR functions noted above. What it should not have is any ‘deputy superintendent for blah blah’. The job of the superintenddnt’s office should be one of administrative support, not line functions. The superintend3nt is the bishop, the principals the pastor. All principals should be direct reports to the superintendent.
4. The curriculum should be implicit in the state regents exams students at a particular school are compelled to take. The menu of subjects offered should be the subset of regents’ subjects prescribed by the school board. The design of the pedagogic program should be in the hands of the principal and the faculty. If there are performance issues, these should be manifest in the league tables assembled by the board of regents and generate audits.
5. The student disciplinary manual for the district should be adopted by the school board, whose discretion should be constrained only by the state penal code and the child protective statutes. The business of implementing that code should be in the hands of the principal assisted by whoever acts as the dean of students at the school. Parent complaints about discipline should be heard by mediators and arbitrators who work for the state education department or state ombudsman, not the superintendent
6. Faculty should be hired out of guild pools which aspirants enter by passing examinations, as should certain professionals like the school nurse and the school psychologist. Staff at schools should be hired according to the results of civil service examinations. Ideally, any school employee could be discharged if three people in his chain of command countersigned a letter of dismissal. Said employee could (with the assistance of union counsel) have the option of bringing an action in front of a set of administrative tribunals in a post-termination review. However, the burden of demonstration would be on the plaintiff in those cases to show (by a preponderance of the evidence) that he was terminated for one of a half-dozen impermissible reasons. If he did so show, he’d be due an indemnity, and an ombudsman could initiate proceedings to terminate (with prejudice) the officials who signed his letter of dismissal.
7. In the case of a regular teacher, the three officials whose signature would have to be on a letter of dismissal would be the teaching department head, the official who functions as the school’s provost, and the principal. The superintendent would be uninvolved unless it was a small school where the principal acted as his own provost.
8. Canning public employees shouldn’t be difficult. Maintaining professionalism in public employment should be undertaken through the recruitment pipeline and incorporate impersonal examinations designed by psychometricians, not judges. However, supervisors should be liable if they start to make public agencies their personal sandboxes, and firing someone for political reasons is just that. Liberals do suck, because they think that sort of thing is just their prerogative.
these are excellent suggestions from Absurd. for once the cancer is excised. not sure sure if that will be possible however.
the patient is going critical. wheel the USA into the ER cardiac room because major systems collapse looks like a possibility..or maybe already underway
De fund Michigan Schools. Pay NO TAX DOLLARS to Extremists who have no interest in the Taxpayers.
If the politically correct ( oxymoron?) have their way the only people allowed to speak will be Mary Poppins’s and parrots. Your country is being made a laughing stock by those clowns.
His type ain’t welcome in these here parts.
This is just the orthodoxy of liberals who are unable to deal with facts and will use any means (violent, vile, evil or unethical) to avoid listening to truth. This teacher deserves a reward for being truthful (President Trump is our President, Schools (should) open in the Fall, based on actual science) and for speaking against intolerant and spiteful orthodoxy that grips our academia. And how absurd that GWU is such an illiberal and malicious institution.
It is the Tweets that got him fired and his union probably did not stand behind him.
The conservative movement in their country is based on racism and white supremacy, and has been since the beginning. Trump is a racist and so are his supporters. These are both facts.
Molly:
Do you listen to yourself?
You sound like a loon.
I hope that it is just menopause and not congenital.
The democrat party is based on racism and has since its beginning! You are a racist and these are both facts!
You’re a Marxist POS, and Marxists have no humanity. These are facts and have been since the beginning. It is the duty of every human being to fight you until your ideology and its adherents are relegated to the dustbin of history.
Slave owners: Democrats
KKK: Democrats
Filibuster of the Civil Rights Act: Democrats
MollyG: Democrat
Those were all conservatives, before the party re-alignment. That is why I did not say “Democrat” or “Republican”.
Look up the term ‘anachronism’ in the dictionary.
“before the party re-alignment”
When and how did that occur, Molly?
(This should be entertaining).
1960s Rhodes. Read a history book. The GOP is no longer the party of Lincoln – most of them now are Confederate sympathizers in their lily white party – and the Democrats are no longer the party of Andrew Jackson and Andrew Johnson.
Is that entertaining enough for you?
most of them now are Confederate sympathizers in their lily white part
No one can figure out if you live in fantasyland or are deliberately lying.
You have some mice in your pockets?
Lying he’s way past fantasyland.
Dude, maybe you should read the comments here to start with and then look at a photograph of GOP Senate and House members and any recent GOP convention. It’s blinding.
Both, I think.
Molly, where do you come up with these ideas? Did you not have any education. Slave owners were Democrats. The Republican Party ended slavery.
What was that ” party re-alignment” you talk about? …Your own ECT?
REGARDING ABOVE:
Mofo is also known as Rhodes and Gray Anonymous.
1. You know nothing.
2. You’re malicious.
3. You should have no discretion over the life of any sentient being.
Go shoot a judge you ignorant misanthrope.
If you had any history on this blog about being right on anything, it would be reasonable to believe that comment wasn’t your daily journal entry. But you don’t and that was.
Olly, absurd justified shooting judges and prosecutors in the thread about the NJ shooting – quickly abandoned for some mysterious reason having to do with how closely the gunmen’s opinions were like most of the posters here.
” … absurd justified shooting judges and prosecutors in the thread about the NJ shooting …”
*******************
Never happened.
absurd justified shooting judges and prosecutors in the thread about the NJ shooting
If this was fact and not your truth, it will not be difficult for you to provide the evidence. Now what did you do with CTHD? She should have been all over your allegation and yet mysteriously she’s silent.
“These are both facts.”
If they were facts you could prove it but you don’t. That leaves us with the only other possible choice stated by another commentator, “You sound like a loon.”
What gets you is a highly opinionated person who doesn’t know the difference between a fact and an opinion. Street level Democrats are like that.
I’m beginning to think that MollyG is Seth’s alter-ego.
His octogenarian spinster aunt.
With Paint Chips (With) one never knows. She fits into the same Stupid category but doesn’t seem to have Paint Chip’s lead poisoned type of speech. She could be from anyone on the blog or another relatively new moron because the supply outside of the blog is filled with them, but most of them seem to be looting, burning buildings, smoking crack or funded by the government. I wonder which class she belongs to.
REGARDING ABOVE:
Rhodes is also Gray Anonymous and MoFo.
I am Seth. I am Spartacus.
How’s that “magna opus” coming, Big Mess?
Did it find its ‘u’ and ‘m’ hopefully? Bahahahahaha
These are both truths.
FIFY. Learn the difference. Good luck.
“The conservative movement in their country”
Are you not in the United States?
LBJ was not a conservative, Molly.
Actually, to be fair, the conservative movement is where environmentalism began for the most part. With senators like John Chafee of RI as one the early backers. Not entirely made up of racists and white supremacists. They just progressively became such as the logical progression of Nixon’s southern strategy. And the movement began to kill off its true conservatives during the Reagan era. Hell, the current crew wouldn’t even consider Reagan conservative. This is the group that crawled out from under a rock. If they’re not entirely racist themselves, they’re entirely comfortable being represented by them.
And Trump is a racist himself. One of the few places where this isn’t common knowledge is in the comments section of the Turley blog. Turley trolls this group for hits so his influencer contractual arrangements carry the most financial value.
“And Trump is a racist himself”
Cite one racist thing he’s ever done.
You’re the obvious bigot and racist, Bugs. Just another guilty dog barking, first ,and loudest, trying to deflect away from your own guilt.
Getting busted with his dad for systemic discrimination in building space rental in the ’70’s. Calling for the death penalty of the kids proven innocent of rape in Central Park. Saying a judge ruled against him because he was Mexican (by way of Indiana), attempted Muslim travel ban actively trolling white supremacists as his voting base, calling African, Central and South American countries shit holes.
The list goes on.
Johnny Buglife – having been part of a family firm, I know the firm is run by the oldest member, regardless of who holds what title. And, they were never able to prove the direction came from Fred or Donald, just from “above.” And only for a few units.
On the Central Park rapists, they ALL confessed to the crime. Do you have proof that the Mexican-American judge did not rule against him because of his heritage? We had a case like that here. The travel ban was on certain countries, not Muslims.
“Saying a judge ruled against him because he was Mexican ” The implication was ***might*** rule against him and when he called him a Mexican he also said “Mexican Heritage”, but accuracy is not your strong suit.
Anyway, Justice Sotomayor claims her heritage is important to her position on the Supreme Court. In other words she is determining what our Constitution means based on her life experience instead of on the Constitution. …Her heritage has a determining fact on her decisions. Based on that alone why shouldn’t Trump worry about the judge’s Mexican Heritage?
.
Allan, just stop talking. You’re incapable of not veering off into the most low level deflections. Do something less embarassing like urinating on yourself in public.
Are you dumb?
Bug, you brought up the ” the Mexican-American” and what Trump felt about how he would judge a case (even though you were inaccurate).
I responded demonstrating the Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor felt the same way about herself as Trump felt about that judge you mentioned.
This is not veering off. This is a response to what you think was bad behavior. Maybe it is bad behavior, maybe not. However that is a good reason that Justice Sotomayor doesn’t belong on the Supreme Court. I’m glad you agree even though you have difficulty recognizing it. You need to substitute your spellchecker for a “critical thinking” module.
Yes, he’s that dumb. Maybe it’s due to TDS
I should add that Biden had no problem using the N word. He was a racist. Trump wasn’t.
Bu said:
“environmentalism began for the most part. With senators like John Chafee of RI as one the early backers”
environmentalism grows out of “conservationism” which is derived from animal husbandry and agriculture as arts, and biology as science.
the first most prominent conservationist Republicans was Teddy Roosevelt
he came a long time before that Chafee fellow, does not deserve to be said in the same breath with TR
https://www.doi.gov/blog/conservation-legacy-theodore-roosevelt#:~:text=After%20becoming%20president%20in%201901,million%20acres%20of%20public%20land
Share
The Conservation Legacy of Theodore Roosevelt
2/14/2020
President Theodore Roosevelt was one of the most powerful voices in the history of American conservation. Enthralled by nature from a young age, Roosevelt cherished and promoted our nation’s landscapes and wildlife. After becoming president in 1901, Roosevelt used his authority to establish 150 national forests, 51 federal bird reserves, four national game preserves, five national parks and 18 national monuments on over 230 million acres of public land.
Today, the legacy of Theodore Roosevelt is found across the country. There are six national park sites dedicated, in part or whole, to our conservationist president. Along with others like John Muir and Rachel Carson, Roosevelt’s words and actions continue to affect how we approach and appreciate the natural world
I know. Chafee was a far supperior politician and human.
Superior to Teddy Roosevelt in your value system maybe. Not mine
Though he did have an excellent combat record i will grant him that
oh!~ that reminds me of another name of an early American patriot and conservationist. a friend of Teddy’s.
Madison Grant, once chair of the New York Zoological Society
He wrote some books you might like, Bug. Check em out! lolz
Might be tough to find in a library. But possibly your study? bahahahahah
what’s a “conservative” ….. what’s a “racist”
these are pigeonholes. I don’t care about such labels. I dont embrace either one. nor do i care. call me whatever you like. free speech and all
Molly, the question is, are you white? I suspect you are. Just answer the question since we cant see each other.
because if you are, then why do you hate your own kind?
do you look in the mirror and hate white skin?
i kind of understand why black folks dont like us at times. but what’s wrong with you?
Kurtz presents a Klan questionaire, circa 2020.
Maybe you should attempt to use that blood clot you call a brain for some other purpose than just to hold your crybaby liberal ears apart.
Good golly, miss molly. Say something enough times and some people will start to believe you. I know I don’t.
Hah! The liberal dogma of today is everyone must be judged on The basis of their race first, sex second.
by the way, do you even know what racism means?
It’s called grooming. For decades Americans have been / are being groomed. The worst part of it all is that we let America become this way. This was done on our watch. The complaining today is farcical.
“the left” is anyone that rejects authoritarian rule
Except that it is Trump who is putting unidentifiable federal police in cities and it isn’t her liberals to want to stop him. Same with every other actual authoritative policies that Trump has done.
The uniforms are clearly marked and you need to pull your head out of Rachel Maddow’s ass.
they day comes when a kryptiea arises which will not wear uniforms nor make arrests
but they will make change
I think when Kurtz speaks there should be a symphony in the background. Or maybe even a Spector wall of sound.
Oh Phil Spector. A murderer and a nut, but a genius in the studio. I agree with his own opinion that the original of this song, with Tina Turner AND Ike, was his best work
Ha!
for this remark however I would have cued up Basil Pouledouris’ “Anvil of Crom”
https://youtu.be/BHfE682mm3c
a second choice would have been “men of harlech”
Stop lying you Marxist terrorist POS. You want to let your terrorist goon squads attack innocent people in the streets, murder people, destroy property, without check so you can gain power. You are an insurrectionists and as such you need to be treated as someone openly taking up arms against the American people and charged with treason and active rebellion. Its long past time we stopped treating you as if you simply had a difference of opinion. Trump needs to step up the arrests of terrorists like you 1,000 fold.
You leftists are the most authoritarian people on the planet because you’re also the weakest and schmuckiest. You cannot compete in any arena that is not stacked in your favor which drives your ressentiment that compels your petty despotic tendencies. A leftist is, by definition, a pathetic and disgusting parasite.
“the left” is anyone that rejects the rule of law.
FIFY. Prove me wrong.
Hey, that includes me!
Maybe he did something else.
Was his language with the “sucks” word nasty?
Do you all know what “sucks” refers to?
Liberals suck man. Or women?
It’s also another case of someone losing their job for expressing an opinion in public and outside of job.
That he even had to discuss that tweet with investigators at work should be chilling enough.
The left has a problem. The left cannot intelligently defend their position. That is why they have to use Stalin like tactics where civil liberties are involved.
Pretty much. See MollyG’s remarks. They have nothing of value to say anymore. Alan Dershowitz, Mark Kleiman and Harold Pollack have had something of value to say. Since Kleiman has died, the number of liberals worth listening to has declined by 1/3.