Canadian Teachers Redefine School Spirit, And Not In A Good Way

In the arena of people that I always think of as asexual, possibly even neutered, teachers rank right up there with grandparents and clergy. I mean, I know that they're human, but still. When I was in high school, the idea of my math teacher dating was inconceivable. He just went home every night and read calculus textbooks, right? Right?

He certainly didn't know his way around a lap dance, I'm pretty sure about that. Not like the teachers at Churchill High School in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

No, really. Imagine that your tween or teen comes home from school and tells you that their science teacher simulated a lap dance with another teacher in front of the entire school. Like, really realistically. So really realistically that it involved gyrating, hip thrusting, and - OH NO THEY DIDN'T - simulated oral sex. Would your head explode?

This, apparently, is exactly what happened to parents of students at Churchill High School. They weren't very happy about it.

There was a - what's the word? - total uproar over the following video - which has been referred to as 'Two Teachers, One Chair' - that was captured by a grade nine student. This spontaneous (or was it planned?) lap dance broke out during a school spirit rally and featured a female teacher as the 'client' and a male teacher as the 'dancer'. I do believe - and correct me if I'm wrong - these teachers have a misguided understanding of school spirit.

The female teacher has been suspended without pay and, according to this article, the other adult has not been publicly identified. Which I think is a tad strange but I'm sure details will leak out soon enough (just like the video.)

To quote an Grade 8 student who witnessed the event, the 'whole school was rattled' and one of the school trustees said 'I want [the teachers] to be role models for our kids. I want them to set the bar high.'

Perhaps that trustee should have clarified that the bar shouldn't be a stripper pole.

So how would react if you were on this school's disciplinary board? Fire them? Call it an overreaction and fill their waist band with loonies and toonies? Do you think that an adult who would use this type of judgment in thinking this behaviour was suitable for their charges to witness is worth a second chance? Inquiring Bad Moms want to know.

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Comments

[ggs_closet]

Wow. Perhaps they are trying out the idea of second jobs? lol
I'm not sure what I would do. Either way I would really like to know WHY they did it? What were they thinking? I mean, I get excited about things to, but I've never have launched in to a stimulated lap dance as a way to express my joy.
On one hand, we are all human and do some incredibly stupid things. On the other hand, I'm not sure I want someone with an obvious case of severe lack of judgment teaching kids.

[Kristin]

Wait.........Okay, I just had to pick my jaw up off the floor. This may be the closest to dumb struck I've been in a long time. One wonders what they expected to happen after this. If nothing else, how do they expect their students to respond?

While I think this displayed incredibly bad judgment I don't think it warrants more than a suspension (on both parts) and a long talk about appropriate behaviour. Realistically none of these kids are scarred by this, disturbed yes, amused absolutely but nobody is traumatized and no one is going to turn to wanton ways as a result.

The biggest casualty here is any respect that students and parents had for these two teachers. I can see that parents might get squeamish about their kids having teachers with such ill-defined boundaries around sexual behaviour around said kids. But it's a far stretch from an ill-advised performance at a spirit rally and inappropriate behaviour with a student.

[Michelle]

This just breaks my heart. So sad that it is fate who decides who are kids teachers are going to be. I worry all-the-time about outside influences on my children and THIS is why.

Sick. Here I thought teachers were mentors!

Makes me want to bundle my kids up and move to a beach hut and scavenger for food ourselves.

[LindsayDianne]

Inappropriate.

[the mombshell]

Just a sec. I need to dust off my soapbox. Ahem, alright it is unfortunate that these two goobers are proceeding my point, but teachers are mentors. For every display of inappropriate behaviour such as the above (I'm not even going to get into it but that guy's form was all wrong, I kid I kid) there are hundreds of teachers, hundreds who care about the well-being and education of kids, your kids. It doesn't usually make it to youtube but there are teachers who take time outside of their jobs to coach, tutor, fundraise, I could go on and on about the positive things teachers do outside of their job descriptions everyday, which a lot of the times goes unnoticed. Now while moving to a beach hut is tempting, there will always be the monkeys and monkeys are dirty birds. Don't give up on teachers, they're good shit.

[the mombshell]

Oh the goobers I was referring to were the teachers in the video not the two commenters before me. Are we good? We're good. xo

[Jessi]

I couldn't have said it better, mombshell. These teachers appear to be idiots. Fine. Whatever. There's something there they aren't getting. But teachers in general - rock. Lately there's been a lot of "Look, here's a bad example of school discipline/teachers/etc. Everywhere must suck. Maybe we should all move to Siberia." I don't really think that's fair. Most teachers and yes, school systems, are trying really hard to educate kids and not just to be strippers.

[stacyg]

They both should have been fired. There is no excuse to justify what they did.

[Jessica]

That. is. so. wrong.
Not only is the school a totally inappropriate place for this, but are these the teachers who are supposed to be policing the kids? When someone is put in a position of responsibility, they should at least *try* to live up to it. If they can't manage they're own behaviour, how are they managing the kids? I'm just imagining walking in horrified on my daughter doing a lap dance for someone... "but I learned it at school!"
I do agree though: teachers, in general, do rock.

[Ashley]

I first saw this story in an article in our local Halifax Nova Scotia newspaper this morning. Which the lead me to the Winnipeg Free Press to read more and actually view the video.

1 word - wow. What were they thinking??

I am a mother, I am also 24. Highschool wasn't all that long ago. If two teachers in MY highschool had of done a strip-tease, gestured show, I could only imagine the outcry from students, other faculty, the school board, and of course, the parents.

Teachers are role models. There are teachers whom I had from elementary through college whom I have looked up to, and continue to look up to. I think these two had a MAJOR lack in judgement. If they didn't think about possible consequences (which I'm pretty sure they didn't), I bet they wish now that they had of.

A

[mt]

Wow what prudes. IF MORE TEACHERS WERE DOWN TO EARTH your kids would trust them. And actually learn more. This is nothing...

[Neen]

Okay, sigh, I live in Winnipeg. My teenagers don't attend Churchill, but a High School with a far worse reputation in the same division. (It's a good school, but it's catchment area includes our neighbourhood and a few that are "less desirable" in real-estate speak, read gang territory).

When this whole thing when viral (and completely ballistic in the local media) this week, I asked them about it. You know what my 16 and 17 year old sons said? The 17 year old said, "Okay, that was dumb, but you're the one who is always talking about distraction in the news media, the teachers should be suspended, but then maybe they could TRY to do something about the drug problem at Churchill, and the fact that there are kids selling pot out of their lockers, and that there are teachers they know will just ignore them if they go to class drunk." (Which, incidentally, would not be these teachers, the teachers my kids would know about are teaching their friends in grade 11 and 12). My 16 year old said, "Whoa, stupid. Look at me commit professional suicide doing a way worse lap dance than the one the kid in the computer lab is watching on the internet."
Yes, there are filters and firewalls, of course the kids know how to get around them, it's a never ending battle.

I think it was stupid. I think they got carried away and their brains were on disconnect (which, COME ON, people, you were AT WORK. You are trying to hold authority over Junior High kids. You can't DO that!). I think they should be suspended, and then if they can actually face another class of sniggering 13 year olds, they can go ahead.

This is not the kind of mistake a person smart enough to get a degree makes twice.

I think the 8th grade student quoted was playing to the media, "The whole school was rattled", my ass, most of the kids thought it was hilarious until they were told they could self-rightously judgemental about their teachers for a change. It wasn't even on the Senior High students radar until the video showed up on their cell phones and kids from other schools started texting them about it. The stuff that goes on with the Grade 8's and 9's never is, they have their own problems and the newbies can take care of themselves for the most part.

Hopefully, this will blow over very soon, and we can go back to working on the very real, very serious problems of drug and alcohol abuse, violence, gangs and poverty that are inherant in an inner-city school system.

(My 17 year old also said, "At least a High School in our division is on TV and somebody didn't get stabbed." We have MUCH bigger problems.)

[Neen]

Oh, and Mombshell and Jessi, please don't for one minute think I blame the teachers for all the ills our schools face. For the most part my kids have truly excellent dedicated teachers who's feet I could kiss for doing a tough job that I wouldn't want in a million years. One of the teachers at their school has a PhD in Chemistry and teaches high school science at an inner-city school for far less money than he could make in the private sector because he believes it the best way to be an influence for good in the world.