A Minnesota substitute teacher was banned from teaching at a local high school after re-enacting George Floyd’s murder with a student by putting his knee on the student’s neck.
According to an email sent to parents of the school’s students, the substitute teacher, who was a also a former police officer, made other inappropriate remarks and re-enacted other violent scenarios with students.
Floyd was murdered by Minnesota police officer Derek Chauvin in May 2020, which incited months-long Black Lives Matter protests.
On Monday, a substitute teacher at Woodbury High School “reenacted the prone restraint that resulted in the murder of George Floyd” with a student, fake punched a student, made “racially-harmful” and sexist comments, denied the existence of police brutality, and spoke in “disturbing detail” about murder and sexual assault cases he had investigated.
The email that the school sent to parents was posted by a Woodbury parent on X.
“We received an email about an incident with a substitute teacher yesterday,” she said in a tweet, “and this is so much worse than I could have imagined.”
In the email, school principal Sarah Sorenson-Wagner said the substitute’s behavior was “reprehensible” and embarassing.
“The reported actions are not, and will not, be tolerated at Woodbury High School,” Sorenson-Wagner said in the email. “We are partnering with Teachers on Call, our substitute contracted vendor, to ensure that this person is removed from the Teachers on Call substitute list and will never be allowed to fill any vacancies in our school district.”
Christopher Ingraham, a Minnesota reporter, posted a photo of the substitute re-enacting the Floyd murder on X. The photo was obtained by Bring Me The News, a local Minnesota outlet.
As reported by Woodbury News Net, the school is working with the Woodbury Police Department to investigate what happened. It also reported the incident to the Minnesota Department of Education.
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