Local Teacher Accused Of Writing Racist Letter
POSTED: 4:43 pm EDT August 17,
2005
UPDATED: 7:25 am EDT August 18,
2005
ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. -- There are accusations that an Orange County teacher is racist. Now that the teacher is off the job.Parents said teacher Jan Hall wrote a letter that claims Puerto ricans "are destroying the city," and the insults didn't stop there.
A local Hispanic newspaper claims the Sadler Elementary School teacher wrote a letter to a congressman blasting Puerto Ricans, Mexicans and Haitians. The teacher admitted to her principal that she wrote a letter to a congressman, but not necessarily the racist letter, with her name attached to it, that ended up in a local newspaper.Hall is under investigation after the letter was leaked to the Spanish newspaper, El Nuevo Dia, with her name attached to it. The two-page letter refers to Puerto Ricans and states, "They are destroying the city everyday."The 58-year-old teacher has been at Sadler Elementary for five years and admitted to writing a letter to an elected official.The letter goes on to read, "Schools are dealing with too many problems which originate in the language differences and that takes teaching time away from our American children whose parents do pay taxes."As people protesting the letter pointed out, Puerto Ricans in the U.S. do pay taxes.The letter also commented on her colleagues at Sadler: "Puerto Ricans teachers who work at my school are constantly asking me for help in math because they only received the equivalent of a fifth grade education in Puerto Rico."The letter includes comments on Mexicans: "They bring drugs and incurable diseases to Florida."The letter also makes a suggestion: "My school is 92 percent Puerto Rican. Please change the laws so these people don't come here and stay in Puerto Rico."And, Haitians are also addressed in the letter: "The Haitians are more aggressive in class and you can tell they haven't attended school before on a regular basis. They're improper conduct is a serious problem."The school district has suspended Hall without pay pending an investigation. Superintendent Ron Blocker is concerned for the children who may be affected by the derogatory comments.Hall hasn't admitted to writing the letter that appeared in the paper. Nonetheless, the district still suspended her.
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