Kelly: Despite hurtful words, teacher didn't deserve to be fired
By MIKE KELLY
RECORD COLUMNIST
RECORD COLUMNIST
JENNIFER O’Brien is not America’s poster child for free speech. Maybe it’s time to anoint her. O’Brien is the Paterson teacher who was fired almost two years ago for writing on her Facebook page that she does not feel like an educator in the classroom but the equivalent of a “warden for future criminals.”
Was she insulting? Of course. Racist? Maybe.
When O’Brien wrote her Facebook posting, she was teaching 23 first graders at Paterson’s School 21. Every student was either black or Hispanic and from one of the poorest neighborhoods in one of America’s poorest cities. O’Brien is white and lives in Elmwood Park.
All this may be interesting to sociologists. But should skin color and the age of students play any role in whether a teacher has constitutional protection to express her views in public?