Story Archive

Parents Could Really Understand His Frustration

An eighth-grade student at Otho E. Stuart Middle School in Commerce City, Colo., took a photo of his teacher’s instructions to the class. “Silent reading,” the instructions read. And then continued: “I want to kill children but I am a loving Christian man who never would hurt a flee so please sit down and read.” After teacher Kris Burghart admitted to school officials he did write that, they put him on administrative leave. Burghart resigned. Parents, meanwhile, want Burghart to continue teaching. “My daughter is so upset about this,” said one mother. “She felt Mr. Burghart was and is a great teacher. We do not support this decision.” Another mother tried to organize parents to “object” to the resignation. But district superintendent Chris Fiedler doesn’t seem amenable to objections. “It is my firm belief that at no time, under any circumstance is it acceptable to threaten harm to our students,” Fiedler wrote to parents — “not as a teaching tool, not as venting frustration, not as a joke.” (RC/Denver Post) ...There could have been some leeway about the threat, but not the terrible spelling and punctuation.