Video Captures Teacher Throwing A Hockey Stick At 2nd Grader’s Face After He Tossed It During Gym Class
She knocked out his front tooth.
Facebook A gym teacher from Minnesota, Kim Neubauer, has been the subject of backlash from a student's parents after she allegedly injured a child during gym class.
The mother of 8-year-old Easton Johnson is breaking her silence because she feels dissatisfied with how her son's school district handled the incident, which happened in March.
Video footage shows the teacher throwing a hockey stick at the child's face, knocking out his front tooth.
As the gym class was ending, all the students could be seen returning their hockey sticks and putting them on a pile.
Easton went ahead to do the same, however, he slightly tossed his hockey stick onto the pile. Neubauer didn’t seem to like it.
She took the same hockey stick from the pile and threw it at Easton’s face which ended up knocking out his tooth. He immediately reacted to the pain and reached out for his face.
Easton then picked up the hockey stick and placed it on the pile slowly. Even the students seemed to be in shock after the sudden incident as a student nearby can be seen covering her face with her hands.
Easton's parents say their son is now anxious about going to school.
Easton’s parents, Lance and Jodi Johnson were devastated after they found out that their son had been assaulted at school.
“The more I watch it it's sad. She's like five feet [away] and didn't even hesitate. She just grabbed it and threw it with force like she was intentionally trying to hurt him," said Lance.
Jodi mentioned that Easton would be going to a different school now. He will be going into a different grade and a different building, however, he still fears such a situation might occur again.
His mom further mentioned that he keeps asking her questions about his new school and its staff.
The teacher was eventually fired for her actions.
After this incident became public, the parents were hoping that some action would be taken against the teacher.
In the aftermath, Neubauer was on unpaid leave for the rest of the school year and was ultimately fired on June 3.
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Before Neubauer’s unpaid leave, the school congratulated her on retirement by posting a Facebook post that has now been deleted.
The school later commented on that while acknowledging their mistake stating that they shouldn't have posted that.
The school's superintendent also talked about the issue mentioning their support for Easton.
"We love our students and we work tirelessly to protect and support them," the superintendent said.
"We welcome and value parent feedback and recognize that together we are stronger and better equipped to respond to any safety concerns that may arise."
This incident was also reported to the Minnesota Department of Education and the local law enforcement. At first, the police refused to investigate, however, after watching the video, the case has been opened for investigation.
In the hopes to create more awareness of the incident, a petition for the family on change.org has been set up.
Sanika Nalgirkar is a news & entertainment writer at YourTango based in Seattle, Washington. She has a master's degree in Creative Writing from the University of Washington. You can check out some of her writing on her website.