A teacher in Florida is in serious trouble with the local school board over woke TikTok videos featuring his students.
On Friday, the Twitter account Libs of TikTok shared the videos posted by Ethan Hooper, a language arts teacher at Howard Middle School in Orange Country, Florida.
One video showed white students acting like servants of black students and seemingly bowing down to them in honor of Black History Month.
In other videos, Hooper mocked education officials for removing inappropriate books from Florida schools.
This Florida teacher made students participate in a skit for black history month where white students act like servants for black students pic.twitter.com/g29SgNd3pn
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 17, 2023
Now, according to Florida’s Voice, Orange County Public Schools has placed Hooper on administrative leave and is implying that he will eventually be terminated from his position.
“Any employee of [Orange County Public Schools] 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,” according to Michael Ollendorff, OCPS media manager.
Firing Hooper would be the right thing to do for several reasons.
First, we need to point out the obvious: That Black History Month video is downright racist. There is no getting around that. Making one group of students act as servants for the others based on race is racist, plain and simple.
Then there is the fact that these young students were entrusted to Hooper so that he could help form their minds. Instead, he exploited them to score political points on TikTok. This man is completely self-interested, the exact opposite of what an educator should be.
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This incident is also a good reminder of why we need to reform the public school system and advocate for school choice.
Even in states like Florida, where Gov. Ron DeSantis has taken strong measures to combat woke indoctrination in schools, these sorts of shenanigans are almost sure to happen because there is no alternative.
If parents had a choice of where to send their children, public schools would quickly get their act together.
But under the current system, where there is absolutely no competition, there is also no incentive for schools to examine their priorities, as they know that parents have no choice but to send their children there.
Thus, the progressive indoctrination of students will continue, regardless of how conservative the state government is.
While we can be relieved that Hooper is facing consequences for his actions, we also need to remember that this is not only about him. This is a much wider problem with the whole public school system.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.