Inappropriate classroom politicking in Asheville Fayetteville
Posted November 6th, 2008 at 5:18 PM by Jon Ham
I’ve seen a lot of teachers wearing Obama buttons in Durham schools, but I figured that was the extent of their politicking. Maybe it was in Durham, but in other areas of the state it wasn’t. Check out this footage from a Swedish Finnish Swedish TV station and ask yourself why you have to learn about things like this from the foreign media. The YouTube page identifies the teacher as Diantha Harris, an Asheville teacher. It doesn’t ID the school, however. A transcript is here:
UPDATE: Asheville Superintendent Allen Johnson says Harris has not been employed by the school system since 2004, so it could be the Swedish Finnish Swedish TV station misidentified the school system.
UPDATE: She now works in Fayetteville, or at least in the Cumberland County system, according to ABC 13, WLOS in Asheville, which makes sense with the Army dependents in her class.
UPDATE: It was a Finnish TV station, apparently. That’s what I had originally as I was first writing this post but I thought I had seen on one of the links that it was a Swedish station, not Finnish, so I changed it to Swedish. Should have left it.
UPDATE: It’s Swedish. I was right. To confirm, I put some of the subtitles through an online translator and chose “detect language.” It translated the subtitles perfectly and identified the language as Swedish, not Finnish. Here is the Web site of the TV station. It has an “se” suffix on its URL, which means Sweden.
November 6th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
[...] as diantha Harris, an Asheville teacher. It doesn??™t ID the school, however. A transcript is here: http://triangle.johnlocke.org/blog/?p=3029Don’t let sick bastards like Diantha Harris abuse your children …5 Nov 2008 … diantha [...]
November 7th, 2008 at 11:27 am
We had a long talk about this in my office on Tuesday afternoon. I’m of the opinion that teachers and other staff in schools should not ever wear any sort of political insignia (beyond a US flag pin) and should not express political opinions as they relate to current political campaigns. School should be neutral from a Democrat vs. Republican vs. independent point of view. Similarly, when you are conducting business, you should not be wearing political insignia; when you are dealing with clients (which is what students in school are), you should try not to unnecessarily offend people.
This is not being PC; I consider this a matter of professional behavior. What you do on your own time is your own business; what you do when you’re at work should be professionally-neutral.
November 7th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
Man, you sure are flip-flopping a lot today, Jon.
November 7th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
Just trying to get it straight. That’ll teach me to assume I’m wrong just because 10 other blogs said it was Finnish. Live and learn.
November 7th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
Meant to add: I’m Finnished messing with this.
November 7th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
There’s Norway you’re Finnished with this.
November 7th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
[...] of Cumberland County Schools, was quick today to pump out his own YouTube video to counteract the one showing one of his teachers disgustingly berate a military dependent about her support for McCain and for her father serving in Iraq. He says appropriate action will be [...]
November 21st, 2008 at 8:34 am
[...] an Asheville teacher. It doesn??t ID the school, however. A transcript is here: UPDATE: Ashevilhttp://triangle.johnlocke.org/blog/?p=3029WLOS TVLocal and national news, events, contests and program schedules. ABChttp://www.wlos.com/Death [...]