A New York City high school Spanish teacher is in trouble for engaging in an "inappropriate and unprofessional act" during a Zoom class.
The act involving Amanda Fletcher, a 14-year veteran teacher, took place in front of her Columbia Secondary School students during a virtual class last September, said a Department of Education report, as reported by New York Daily News.
“While she was supposed to be teaching a class, Fletcher ... engaged in a clearly inappropriate and unprofessional act,” Anastasia Coleman, a top schools investigations official, said in the Oct. 29 Special Commissioner of Investigation for the New York City School District report.
Video clips captured by her students showed Fletcher rocking "her head back and forth” as she sucked on the unidentified companion’s nipple, then “gyrated her shoulders and smiled,” the report said.
The 37-year-old teacher then got back to teaching and helping students in finishing a worksheet.
According to the report, the alleged behavior started about 12 minutes before the class got over, and the students were still present on the call, reported the New York Post. Before this incident, students watched Fletcher “eating spaghetti” with the shirtless man walking behind her, said the report.
Several videos of Fletcher were circulated by students on various social media sites. The investigation began after a student at the school and her mother complained about the Sep. 30 incident.
The report urged that Fletcher face unspecified disciplinary action. “This behavior is absolutely unacceptable and we have strict remote teaching policies in place,” Danielle Filson, a spokeswoman for the Education Department said in a statement.
“The teacher has been reassigned away from the classroom while the DOE pursues disciplinary action." Filson said that the DOE imposed “Digital Media Guidelines for Remote Learning” in March 2020.
It “reminded school-based staff that virtual classrooms should follow the same protocols as in-person classrooms – e.g. outside individuals are not permitted to walk into a classroom, whether virtual or in-person – and staff must continue to maintain a safe and appropriate learning environment.”
According to a now defunct profile on the school’s web site, Fletcher teaches various levels of Spanish, including an Advanced Placement class. She was raised in Indiana and attended DePauw University before studying overseas in Spain and Latin America.
