California teacher put on leave over Zoom rants
A California school district placed one of its teachers on administrative leave after she was caught yelling during a Zoom session and "going off" about parents during another.
The videos were posted on social media and involve a high school teacher for San Marcos Unified School District in Southern California, according to the Reopen California Schools Twitter account, which shared the videos.
In one clip, a person asks about a "white student union."
"You don't need a white student union," the teacher yells. "You get everything."
According to Reopen California Schools, a group that supports parents’ right to choose between in-person and remote instruction, the incident involved the teacher and one of her students.
In the second video, the teacher rants about her students' parents and "dares" them to come at her.
"If your parent wants to come talk to me about how I'm not doing a good enough job in distance learning, based on what you need as an individual, just dare them to come at me," she says. "Because I am so sick to my stomach of parents trying to tell educators how to do their job. I have never once gone to a doctor's appointment and tried to tell my medical health provider how to treat me. You know why? Because I know nothing about that. I didn't get my degree in medicine."
She adds: "I am going off, I'm sorry. This is my 'go off' period."
The San Marcos Unified School District said in a statement that the teacher was put on leave and "will be afforded due process."
"We are deeply concerned about the recent videos that have surfaced regarding one of our employees; this is a matter that we take very seriously and it is receiving our highest scrutiny," district spokesperson Jennifer Machado said.
"As a personnel issue that is under investigation, and consistent with district practice, we are limited in the amount of information that we can share."
The teacher was identified by media outlets as Alissa Piro, an English teacher at San Marcos High School. She did not immediately return a request for comment on Tuesday.
