Teacher fired for using broom to break up Detroit classroom fight

[Jazzy]

DETROIT, MI -- A teacher who swatted a student with a broom while trying to break up a frenzied fight between two teenagers was fired over the incident by the Education Achievement Authority.

The fight occurred in a classroom at Pershing High School, one of 15 low-performing Detroit schools taken over by the state-run Education Achievement Authority in 2012.

Cellphone video footage of the incident obtained by WJBK-TV shows the teacher frantically trying to stop the fight using a broomstick before the two were finally separated from each other, apparently by classmates.

Teachers in the EAA turnaround district are not represented by unions.

Keith Johnson, president of the Detroit Federation of Teachers, which represents educators in the traditional Detroit Public Schools, said the teacher was caught in a Catch 22.

"Unfortunately, the method that she used, in terms of swatting one with a broom, is a violation of the corporal punishment provision under the Michigan school code," he told WJBK. "But she's caught in a quandary because under that same code she's expected to do what is necessary to diffuse a situation."

The two boys involved in the fight were suspended.

Watch the video

Do you think this teacher deserved to be fired? Why / Why not?

 

[Evil Eye]

No, but I wouldn't want to work there.

 

[Bluezone777]

I like to know what they who fired her would have done to break up the fight. I am sure dead silence is all you would get to that question so I wouldn't expect much of an answer to be honest.

I am quite certain they are more interested in avoiding law suits then protecting the safety of the students hence her firing. I am quite certain if she just looked the other way that they would have let her get away with that as that can be explained away in a court of law so they can't be sued. If they were concerned with their safety then they would not have fired her as she did nothing that harmed anyone.

 

[DrLeftover]

She's better off.

The story said this was a 'low performing school'.

There's a reason.

 

[Jazzy]

She might be better off but getting fired doesn't look very good on your resume. I think she should fight this, get her job back and then look for a position elsewhere.