It was reading week across America, and second graders from the Hinds School District in Mississippi were waiting for the administrator to read to them.
The administrator forgot it was her turn, said Toby Price, assistant principal of Gary Road Elementary School in Hinds County, who was in his office at the time. Decided to fill.
Mr. Price, 46, quickly grabbed the book I Need a New Ass! Don Macmillan, one of his children’s favorite books, and started reading it to about 240 second graders via Zoom.
Later that day, March 2, District Superintendent Delesitia Martin called him to her office and told him he was on administrative leave, Mr. Price said. He was fired two days later on charges of violating the Standards of Conduct section of the Mississippi Educator Code of Ethics.
In a letter to Mr. Price, the superintendent called the book “inappropriate”. In particular, she took issue with the story’s references to farting and how “the book described stocks of various colors, shapes, and sizes (example: fireproof, bulletproof, explosion-proof)”. Ms. Martin called Mr. Price “unprofessional” for choosing this book.
“I expected that they would write,” said Mr. Price, who worked in the district for three years. “I didn’t expect to be fired. I cried all the way home.”
Mr Price, who has worked in education for 20 years, said he had hired a lawyer and planned to fight the dismissal in front of the school board.
Ms. Martin and the five-member school board did not immediately respond to messages asking for comment on Friday. But Mr. Price’s dismissal drew sharp criticism from children’s authors and American PEN, a free-speech organization that fights book bans.
The book, published in 2012, is about a boy looking for a new butt after discovering a “crack”. Credit… I need a new ass cover.
PEN America’s letter said that “by positioning the act of reading a book as a violation of ethics, the district implies that any educator could be fired under similar circumstances,” a fear that many teachers are already grappling with since last fall’s Republican-led assassination banned schools from teaching and discussing issues of race, racism and other “schismatic concepts”.
On the elementary school’s Facebook page, the grandmother of a student at the school posted the news of Mr. Price’s dismissal and said she planned to speak on his behalf to the school board and fight for “his job back.”
“My granddaughter heard him read the book and thought it was fun and not inappropriate at all!” grandmother wrote.
Mr. Price said that was the reaction of the students after he read the book. He remembered walking out into the hallway and being approached by students who thanked him for his choice.
“They liked it,” he said. “They all stopped me and said, Price, this book was really good.”
The Hinds County School District has about 5,500 students and 425 teachers and spans half a dozen cities near Jackson, Mississippi. .
Mr Price said it was especially important to teach literacy at his school, where many children rely on free or discounted meals.
“We have a lot of reluctant readers,” he said. “I’m a firm believer that reluctant readers need silly, funny books to get them hooked.”
“I need a new ass!” which was published in 2012, is aimed at children aged 4 to 8 and tells the story of a little boy who goes looking for a new one behind him after he sees a “crack” in his and fears that it is broken.
Mr. Price said school officials told him they were concerned they would receive complaints from parents about this.
When called to the boss’s office, he said that one of the administrators asked him, “Is that what you find funny?”
Mr. Price replied, “Well, that’s how it was before I came in here.”
He said he wanted his job back just to support his three kids. His two older children, a 19-year-old daughter and an 18-year-old son, suffer from severe autism.
“I’m tired. I’m stressed. I’m overwhelmed,” he said. “I have to work.”