An Ontario teacher was placed on leave after being accused of using “transphobic” language for voicing concern during a board meeting about the presence of books that celebrate medical gender transition in school libraries.
The teacher, Carolyn Burjoski, claims she is being “bullied, slandered and abused” for arguing that some books in libraries were inappropriate for children.
The Waterloo Region District School Board Chair Scott Piatkowski cut short Burjoski’s presentation after she said the school libraries have books that make the medical transition seem “simple” and “cool” available to kindergartners through sixth-grade students.
The board, which oversees over 100 schools in the region, voted 5-4 to back up the chair’s decision.
In a video posted on Twitter, Burjoski said that she was informed the following morning by human resources that she was “immediately assigned to home, pending a formal investigation and banned from contacting my colleagues and students.”
During her presentation, the teacher started reading from the book Rick by Alex Gina, in which the protagonist discovers that he is asexual.
In her social media video, Burjoski said that “board members have taken to radio, television, social media to grossly misrepresent her remarks.”
She also said, “The school board has removed video of the meeting from their YouTube channel, so people are not able to hear what she actually said.”