'Absolutely pathetic': Teacher under-fire over harsh criticism of student's work
A primary school teacher is reportedly being investigated after a social media post criticising her harsh feedback of a young student went viral.
Chris Piland took to Facebook to voice his displeasure at his son's Year 2 teacher after she wrote a remark on his maths assignment.
Written in red ink above the assignment, which features 50 subtraction problems, the teacher allegedly wrote of the seven-year-old’s work: "Absolutely pathetic. He answered 13 in 3 min! Sad."
Next to the comment was a hand-drawn sad face.
Sharing a photo of his son’s worksheet to Facebook on April 16, Mr Piland slammed his boy’s teacher, identified as Alyssa Rupp Bohenek, at Valley View Elementary School in Pennsylvania, US.
“My son’s teacher has been so rude to him and myself all year he comes home with this and I am beyond frustrated that someone would write this on a child’s work, such great motivation,” he wrote.
Head of school Rose Minniti was made aware of the remarks written on the assignment on Tuesday, according to the news outlet.
After a meeting between the Valley View School District and the teacher, an investigation was initiated.
A Change.org petition calling for the teacher’s termination has already garnered more than 14,000 signatures.
“It’s a personnel issue and the results of that are not going to be dictated by social media,” Ms Minniti told the news outlet.
“It’s going to be dictated by the facts and evidence.”
Still, many online are calling for the teacher to be fired.
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"Alyssa Rupp Bohenek is a teacher for the Valley View school district that thinks it's ok to bully and talk down to her students, and needs to be removed," the petition reads.
"Fire Alyssa Rupp Bohenek."
A counter-petition has been launched in defence of Ms Bohenek, but it did repeatedly misspell her last name and has only 600 signatures so far.
Those in support of Ms Bohenek believe "it is something she should [be] reprimanded for but certainly not fired over”.
“As always with everything, we’re going to try to do what’s best for the students and what we need to do for the employee under investigation,” Ms Minniti said.
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