Teacher Suspended After Students Report Feeling Intimidated

[foodsmith]

https://www.castanet.net/news/Vernon/20 ... e-in-class

Two previous suspensions for this teacher, both relatively extensive and without pay; this is extremely difficult to have occurred in the teaching field and unbelievably rare given the strength of their Union.

According to the Resolution Agreement embedded in the article, he had 1 for the very same offense as this one, and for allowing his students to use the same "relaxed" language in his classroom in 2009.

Furthermore, there was a suspension following "boundary violations with a Grade 12 Student" in 2009. What exactly does this mean? It could mean anything!

No explanation can be found for what this violation is or was... Anyone have any tips on how to track this info down? As a parent, I find this very, very concerning.

[Merry]

https://www.castanet.net/news/Vernon/206432/bad-language-in-class

Two previous suspensions for this teacher, both relatively extensive and without pay; this is extremely difficult to have occurred in the teaching field and unbelievably rare given the strength of their Union.

According to the Resolution Agreement embedded in the article, he had 1 for the very same offense as this one, and for allowing his students to use the same "relaxed" language in his classroom in 2009.

Furthermore, there was a suspension following "boundary violations with a Grade 12 Student" in 2009. What exactly does this mean? It could mean anything!

No explanation can be found for what this violation is or was... Anyone have any tips on how to track this info down? As a parent, I find this very, very concerning.

While I don't know how you can get the info you seek, and in no way defend the teacher's use of inappropriate language, I can't help feeling there's a bit more to this story than meets the eye.

For example, if you spend any time listening to groups of high school kids these days you will hear lots of language that is far more shocking than that reported to have been said by this teacher. So, knowing that, I find it hard to believe that the students felt "intimidated" or shocked when they heard the teacher using the language he did, because they are used to hearing far worse language on a daily basis from their peers (not to mention the language they hear on TV, or at the movies, or in the songs they listen to).

Also, even though the teacher's reaction was definitely inappropriate, I have to wonder at the student behaviour that led him to appear visibly angry and raise his voice when addressing the class.

Teachers these days have very few "tools" at their disposal to help them deal with students who are disruptive in class, refuse to follow instructions, and frequently use bad language. Yet such students can make it difficult, if not impossible, for teachers to effectively do their job, and often make it just as difficult for the other students in the class to learn.

So, while this particular teacher's behaviour is clearly not the way to react when dealing with such students, it's not good enough for society to simply criticize without offering a more appropriate solution. Society needs to discuss how students who are disruptive in the classroom should be dealt with. For example, if the teacher asks a student to stop a certain behaviour, and the student ignores the teacher (or worse, tells the teacher to "bleep" off), what should the teacher do?

I've seen situations where the teacher ordered the student to leave the classroom, and was ignored. I've also seen situations where a phone call made to the parents has resulted in the comment "what the bleep do you expect ME to do about it? I can't control him/her at home either". And I've seen situations where the police have been called to deal with disruptive students, but is that really a good use of police time (and taxpayer money)? Shouldn't the police be out catching criminals, as opposed to being used to help discipline badly behaved students?

The point is that while we can all agree teachers shouldn't be using the kind of language this guy used, what do we think teachers ought to be doing to prevent unruly students from disrupting the classroom?

[Nedroj]

Mr Morgan was a teacher at VSS when I was in highschool back 17 years ago and i can tell you he was one of the good ones. He was there because he loves to teach and not just for a paycheck. We all have had both of these types so you know what I mean. He treated students the same way he would treat any adult that showed respect or in cases where disrespect was shown he would respond in kind. Yes he used language that most old schoolers wouldn't but that's what made him related with the students more. He prepped students for the real life more than most teachers did. and I agree with the posters points on the behavior of teenagers these days probably being the route cause of his frustrations. I know teenagers 17 years ago were crude and disrespectful at times, making it very hard for the teacher to do his/her job and given the attitude of the current generation I cant imagine that disrespectful behavior has become any better. just my 2 cents

[Ken7]

Teachers these days have very few "tools" at their disposal to help them deal with students who are disruptive in class, refuse to follow instructions, and frequently use bad language. Yet such students can make it difficult, if not impossible, for teachers to effectively do their job, and often make it just as difficult for the other students in the class to learn.
?

I'm with you on this. It would be interesting to see actual video of this classroom as he likely was pushed to the point where he lost it.

Sadly, in todays day and age, teacher and anyone with authority are troubled with no course of action for youth who wish to misbehave. Yet on the other hand parents also do not wish to enforce the rules, curb bad conduct or parent their poorly raised children. Not all are that way, but all you need is 1% of a class to be fools and it is disturbing and disruptive.

I will bet on it, the little angels who were creating the problem were not disciplined and I wonder if the class was interviewed individually to get to the root of the problem. No it is not right for the teacher to blow off but again I'd love to hear the rest of the story.

As a teacher, they have always been whipping poles with no power. When I was in school, a teacher could drag you to the principal. That was not the problem, only when you arrived home to your parents! You respected patents, teachers, elders and Law Enforcement when I was a youth.

[dontrump]

Morgan was visibly angry when teaching Grade 8 students, and raised his voice when addressing the class. Morgan would tell students to "shut up" and "shut your mouth" if they were talking in class....Morgan swore and used inappropriate language in class, using words like "*bleep*", "*bleep*", "*bleep*" and "prick" and told students to "stop *bleep*" Some students reporting feeling uncomfortable, anxious, intimidated and scared.

students these days have become what we call the liberal snowflake society;; IF parents would teach their kids to be respectful
iam sure a teachers job would be a lot less stressful;;

[foodsmith]

Did everyone miss that this was the third time he was disciplined? Does no one acknowledge a serious pattern of inability to conduxt himself professionally and to demonstrate the ability to abide by his own professional Standard and Ethics?

Did no one else take the time to research the BC Teachers Regulations database to see the particulars of his offenses that aren't reported here? They're a matter of public record and available to anyone...

I would encourage everyone to do so, rather than attempting to find fault in the victims here. There was obviously a cause or catalyst which led to this outburst, yes, but the affect was felt by the other potentially dozens of uninvolved young people -- adolescents aged 13 and 17, respectively -- who may have been innocent bystanders, just attending class, being subjected to this abuse. It is likely these are the very students who expressed such negative emotions as a result of this incident; this in no way whatsoever shows that they are "weak", "snowflakes", or anything but mature enough to stand up and say when something is truly wrong. Is that not what we teach our children as Parents?

As for past disciplinary action... Don't even get me started. Just search the database, read a little and think critically before passing judgement, and perhaps your tune might change. If not, at least you'll be making an informed decision that's not based on assumption.

To be honest, after what I've read I don't understand how this man remains in his position.

https://www.bcteacherregulation.ca/Cert ... cher.aspx#

[Merry]

Did everyone miss that this was the third time he was disciplined? Does no one acknowledge a serious pattern of inability to conduxt himself professionally and to demonstrate the ability to abide by his own professional Standard and Ethics?

Did no one else take the time to research the BC Teachers Regulations database to see the particulars of his offenses that aren't reported here? They're a matter of public record and available to anyone...

I would encourage everyone to do so, rather than attempting to find fault in the victims here. There was obviously a cause or catalyst which led to this outburst, yes, but the affect was felt by the other potentially dozens of uninvolved young people -- adolescents aged 13 and 17, respectively -- who may have been innocent bystanders, just attending class, being subjected to this abuse. It is likely these are the very students who expressed such negative emotions as a result of this incident; this in no way whatsoever shows that they are "weak", "snowflakes", or anything but mature enough to stand up and say when something is truly wrong. Is that not what we teach our children as Parents?

As for past disciplinary action... Don't even get me started. Just search the database, read a little and think critically before passing judgement, and perhaps your tune might change. If not, at least you'll be making an informed decision that's not based on assumption.

To be honest, after what I've read I don't understand how this man remains in his position.

https://www.bcteacherregulation.ca/Cert ... cher.aspx#

My understanding is that this is the second time he's been disciplined (not the third), once in 2010 and this most recent disciplinary action which was for what happened back in 2016.

Without knowing all the details about what happened last November I'm not prepared to support destroying this guy's career because, even though his behaviour was inappropriate, we still don't know what the circumstances were that led up to it.

Teacher's these days have very little "tools" at their disposal to deal with problem students, so it's not surprising that sometimes their frustrations lead to inappropriate behaviour. After all, they're only human. That doesn't mean society should condone such inappropriate behaviour but, unless it can be shown that it was really detrimental to the student's well being in some way, then I don't think we should destroy the teacher's career because of it. Disciplinary action yes (and that's what happened), but totally removing him from the job? No.

Kids at High School age are not immune to being exposed to bad language; in fact I doubt it's possible these days to get through your high school years without hearing quite a lot of it. So, even though I don't approve of teachers using such language, I doubt very much that the kids who heard it were "damaged" in any way.

[foodsmith]

1. Every article in the province, and nation-wide via CBC -- including the Content Resolution Agreement embedded in the original Castanet article -- cites THREE disciplinary actions.

2. Where exactly did I say any other student had been damaged by hearing "swearing"? The point is they declared feeling "intimidated", "scared", "uncomfortable", and described the learning environment as "negative" because of his actions. Does this equate to what we consider a professional adult? That is the question. Whether or not kids or adolescents hear swears as part of every day life is moot; whether they should ever hear it from a trusted person who they ought to see as a Mentor, a Leader, a Safe Person is a question -- even moreso applicable is the consideration of the swearing being ties to descriptively uncontrolled anger.

That's just unacceptable to me as a Parent when putting my children in the care of a trusted, educated, seasoned professional of 23 years.

Look, I have provided the tools to research the particulars of those individual incidents, and whether you or anyone chooses to or not is up to you or them... The database will only show two because anything occurring prior to July 01, 2007, is not available online -- but the details are outlined in the 2010 resolution.

Aside from that, no one is asking you to 'trash this guy's career'. Honestly, if he hasn't been able to do it on his own by downloading porn during class time or engaging in discussion of sexual activities with a Grade 12 girl via Facebook (it's public record; search it via the publicly accessed database provided above), then what makes you think you can?

[dontrump]

All BS :: Most all Students are all liberal snowflakes these days due to Liberal upbringings ;; this teacher may have over done things BUT iam sure the students did everything they could do to provoke the guy in the first place
every parents attitude these days is my Jenney/Johnny is a perfect loving child and therefore no blame shall be applied in his/her direction because I say so

[foodsmith]

I think you're missing the point here.

His regulatory body found him guilty enough and discovered enough evidence to recommend a Content Resolution -- this means he was in violation of his professional Code of Conduct and BC Education Standards. Had he chosen to not participate in the Content Resolution Agreement, this would have gone to a hearing -- in which he likely would have lost his Certification due to the boundary violations committed when he discusses sexual activities with one of his female Grade 12 students... Or again when he downloaded porn during classroom time (which means he had up to 30 children sitting in front of him while he accessed, downloaded, saved, and 'reblogged' porn to his personal site... Again, perhaps do some research? The link is literally right in front of you!)... Or when he exhibited the same behaviour as that which warranted the current reprimand against a group of 13/14 year old children...

You can refer to kids these days as 'liberal snowflakes' all you like, but a child or adolescent's disposition becomes moot when their safety or his motives come into question. Even better, do what I did and read ALL of the recent Content Resolution s from the last 12 months. There are events that make his most recent one seem quite inside (See "Low" for something comparable)) yet the outcome was faaaaaar less severe. Now why would that be?

Because this is a pattern of misconduct-oriented behaviour for this Teacher. Heck, even read above to see how far back it likely goes -- there's a former student from 17 years ago speaking about him doing the very thing he has been reprimanded for twice now. Seems he just didn't get caught for awhile...

You see, by your logic, it's okay to ignore Professional Standards; it's okay to accept that someone will continually toe the line and cross it wantonly, like someone considering stealing third base -- except in his stadium that act is absolutely, positively, inarguably forbidden and he doesn't seem to care.

Tell you what... Next time you seek legal advice, consider how you'd feel if your Lawyer broke privilege and discussed confidential information with opposing Counsel; next time you see your Doctor, pass him a flask -- I mean, hey, they're only standards; next time you speak with a Counsellor, consider how you'd feel if you were sitting at dinner later and overheard someone talking about your earlier private conversation, realizing that Counsellor shared the gritty details of your life with a friend... no big deal, right? They're just professional standards meant to maintain professional conduct and ethics. Bah! Whatever. No point in being all 'liberal snowflake' about it.

My point is this: Youth, and their outward disposition or behaviour, is not what ought to be brought into question here.

There are thousands of outstanding teachers in this Province; thankfully, judging by the number of Resolutions and Hearings decision available via the BC regulations portal, those that conduct themselves like Mr. Justin Morgan are very few and far between. Why? Because they understand that they are in a role that matters; that you don't naturally connect as a Mentor with young people by adding curse/swear words to your everyday talk, but by actually teaching and demonstrating the language and disposition of business and professionalism through expectation; that you don't set a good example of how the 'real world' works by discussing sexual habits with children more than half your age or by singling out certain people for doing certain things ("kids that wear hats to school are d#&kheads"); that self-awareness and solidarity is strongest when everyone remains on the same page, working to preserve the integrity of their profession; that there are inherent challenges in this field, inclusive of underfunding, behavioural management, staffing issues, poor administration, and the like -- but you do your job as you've agreed to do, and you get angry like everyone else because that is the human condition: to get angry in these situations, and that is perfectly okay!

But you by no means ever have the right to take it out on the whole because of the actions of the few; furthermore, if you are to address it with the few, you are to do so in line with your own standards and code of conduct. Why? Because you are in a mentorship role.

Still think it's right or justified to yell or swear in a room full of kids? Sit in a room as part of a group of adults with someone that has "lost it", and tell me how you feel. Process it. Now devolve your brain several years and remove the executive functioning and prefrontal cortex development needed to reason resourcefully. Think you'd be up comfortable as an adult? Imagine what it's like when you literally don't have the cognitive capacity to executives process what's happening because your brain has gone straight to fight or flight.

There may have been one or more antagonists in the group that caused the outburst, but everyone is affected and that is not okay. Period. Ever.

[dontrump]

its become rather obvious you have a personal vendetta against this particular teacher for reasons we don't know
When a person has such they tend to lose track of the real issues at hand; it as it turns out it does suggest hes not the best teacher we have in the system however iam totally confident if hes as bad as you want others to believe he would have lost his job and teaching certificate a long time ago ;; time will tell

[foodsmith]

*facepalm*

*removed*

The commentary was about the standards, Trump, not the individual, per se, as the responses focused on victim blaming in absence of all the information.

If you had read the thread itself, you'd see it began with a request as to how to gather that information; via several PMs this was passed on, and thus shared. Now, please, provide me with at least some insight into just how that translates into 'vendetta'.

I mean, inject whatever conjecture or supposition you'd like to satisfy your own moral dilemma(s)... Facts are facts; standards are standards. Yet you choose to continue to attempt to manoeuvre away from those. Peculiar, isn't it?

[Chyren]

Its funny how people equate "professional" with "sit there and shut up" when dealing with problem children.

People in authority should "act professional" which means "do nothing and call someone in a higher authority to do nothing."

How about we as a society raise our kids to respect authority and stop assuming that teachers and doctors and health care providers and emergency services personnel need to raise people's kids for them.

I'm certain these kids are being reported over and over and over again to their parents and when someone snaps then the system is broken. I'm stunned this doesn't happen all the time.

[Ken7]

its become rather obvious you have a personal vendetta against this particular teacher for reasons we don't know
When a person has such they tend to lose track of the real issues at hand; it as it turns out it does suggest hes not the best teacher we have in the system however iam totally confident if hes as bad as you want others to believe he would have lost his job and teaching certificate a long time ago ;; time will tell

Wouldn't it be nice to have had the incident on video. I would suggest the students were all listening intently, yes sir, no sir. Then for no apparent reason he lost his cool and snapped throwing a few F bombs out there, just because.

Not because for the fifth time some smart *bleep* student did something that was not right or was disturbing the class knowing they should have a kick in the pants for, although if they did Mommy would defend the rotten little Bstrd as she too has no parenting skills or control.

IF there is such a thing as karma, I do hope one day Mommy realizes she failed and sonny gives her what she deserves.

[the truth]

Mr Morgan was a teacher at VSS when I was in highschool back 17 years ago and i can tell you he was one of the good ones. He was there because he loves to teach and not just for a paycheck. We all have had both of these types so you know what I mean. He treated students the same way he would treat any adult that showed respect or in cases where disrespect was shown he would respond in kind. Yes he used language that most old schoolers wouldn't but that's what made him related with the students more. He prepped students for the real life more than most teachers did. and I agree with the posters points on the behavior of teenagers these days probably being the route cause of his frustrations. I know teenagers 17 years ago were crude and disrespectful at times, making it very hard for the teacher to do his/her job and given the attitude of the current generation I cant imagine that disrespectful behavior has become any better. just my 2 cents

i had a teacher back in grade 8 also in the 80's , he was way worse than what they are saying about this teacher, but guess what ,all the students loved him ,he really was a great teacher, most kids now not all are just wimps ---