Teacher on leave after using students in TikToks that mock FL Dept. of Edu for removing inappropriate books

A Florida middle school teacher’s blatant political exploitation of students begged one simple question: “How is this okay?”

The left has remained up in arms over Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) leading his state to seal up favored inroads of indoctrination like propaganda disguised as curriculum or, in some cases, overt pornography marketed as culturally enriching. In response to the possibility of losing readily accessible tools to program future Democratic voters, Howard Middle School teacher Ethan Hooper of Orange County used his students as pawns in a number of questionable videos.

In one of the latest exposures by social media stalwart Libs of TikTok, Hooper can be seen in the “POV: A Florida Teacher” segments declaring “About to run up on these kids and start banning these books right away.”

As Libs put it, “Florida teacher makes students participate in a series of tiktoks mocking the FL Dept of Education for removing books from schools containing pornography, CRT, and gender ideology.”

From there on, Hooper proceeds around the group of middle school students reading off the titles of books like “Harry Potter” and “Wonder” as confiscates them as “Problematic Books.” In another segment, adorned with a “Black Teachers Matter” shirt, he then pulls dictionaries away from the students contending even those are inappropriate before, in the final snippet, he has the class lined up reciting fictional dogma:

“I shall not read books.”

“Books are bad.”

“If I read it’s approved by the Feds.”

In a separate video highlighted by Libs, Hooper had his white students behave as servants to the black students in recognition of Black History Month.

Understandably outraged, the public reached out demanding action and DeSantis’ 2022 gubernatorial reelection campaign rapid response director Christina Pushaw shared the news that Hooper was placed on administrative leave and Orange County Public Schools Media Manager Michael Ollendorff told Florida’s Voice, “swift action” was forthcoming.

Ollendorff said, “Any employee who creates videos or other content with students in an effort to exploit them for political purposes will be immediately removed from the classroom, placed on administrative leave and swift action will be taken to terminate employment.”

The same sentiment was expressed by Superintendent Maria Vazquez who told the outlet, “I am appalled at the behavior and judgement of the teacher who posted the inappropriate videos using his students as political props. This is not free speech — it is the exploitation of our students for political purposes and it will not be tolerated in our school district.”

It remains unclear whether Hooper had sought permission from the students’ parents before having them perform for his videos but reactions to the viral posts showed wide spread support for the Orange County School Districts expected handling of the teacher who, at the time of this posting, was still listed as a Language Arts teacher.

https://twitter.com/roswells51/status/1626671298247266305

https://twitter.com/PatrickGilmar15/status/1626609152691957767

Kevin Haggerty

Comment

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

Latest Articles