Muslim Teacher Fired After Showing Malala Video – The Daily Beast

If as recounted, another alarming sign of intolerance and discrimination:

“[Principal] Suzanne Cooley received a complaint from the parent of a student about Plaintiff’s use of the Malala Yusufzai video during a lesson,” Hashem’s suit reads. Her supervisor allegedly “told Plaintiff that she could not teach current events in the same manner as her non-Arab, non-Palestinian and non-Muslim colleagues.”

During a later meeting with the district’s superintendent, Cristina Steffner, Hashem says she pointed out that her colleague had played “the same video and it was not a problem,” the suit reads. “Defendant Steffner slammed her hand on the table and said, ‘You are not Lindsay.’ Unlike Plaintiff, Lindsay Wagner is not Arab, not Palestinian and not Muslim.”

Parental complaints apparently started to stack up against Hashem. Some allegedly objected to Hashem’s involvement in a class discussion on a book called Lemon Tree, which tells of an unlikely friendship between Israeli and Palestinian men. A coworker had allegedly asked Hashem to translate a Skype conversation between the students and the Palestinian man featured in the book.

Other parents allegedly complained that Hashem had used a common document-based question that asked students to “compare the actions of John Brown at Harper’s Ferry to the actions of Osama bin Laden on September 11, 2001.” The question is frequently shared on blogs and online databases for U.S. History teachers, according to the lawsuit.

Students allegedly began targeting Hashem online. The lawsuit claims that one student, whose parents had previously complained about Hashem, wrote a Facebook post accusing her of being anti-Israel. Hashem’s brother was a terrorist, the student allegedly claimed in the Facebook post, adding that Hashem was attempting to indoctrinate students with anti-Semitic views.

The Facebook post prompted another meeting with school administrators, according to the lawsuit, in which they allegedly “accused her of discriminating against Jewish students, and also questioned her about her place of birth, her family, and her personal life.”

Hashem was allegedly asked not to reference her cultural or religious background into the classroom, and to refrain from referencing Islam or the Middle East.

But it wasn’t apparently enough for a growing contingent of parents.

“A local Rabbi and several parents contacted the high school administration, including Defendants Cooley and Steffner, and Defendant Board of Education in an attempt to have Plaintiff removed from her teaching position, solely because of her heritage and religion,” Hashem claims.

By April 2015, the school district laid the groundwork for Hashem’s removal. The lawsuit claims that the principal and superintendent “wanted her gone,” and says that Hashem’s supervisor allegedly gave her a poor performance review, indicating that her contract would not be renewed for the following school year. (Hashem has a 3.47/4 rating on the website RateMyTeachers.com, which allows students to anonymously grade their teachers. Her five ratings are generally positive, except for one negative review uploaded after Hashem filed her lawsuit.)

Hashem appealed her contract’s non-renewal in a May 2015 meeting. But while approximately 60 students and parents arrived to support Hashem, according to the lawsuit, the school district’s attorney allegedly turned them away at the door, opting to hold the meeting in private except for five supporters who were allowed in one at a time to speak in Hashem’s defense. Hashem was only given 30 minutes to present her case, she says.

Source: Muslim Teacher Fired After Showing Malala Video – The Daily Beast