PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — A Rhode Island middle school teacher fired after jokingly dragging a girl across the floor by the ankle after she refused to go to gym class has his job back.
The Providence Journal reports that the state education commissioner has reinstated Tiverton Middle School English teacher Christopher Fielding, who was fired by the town’s school committee after the February 2015 incident.
A hearing officer for Commissioner Ken Wagner found that Fielding’s behavior showed an error in judgment but did not warrant his termination because there were “no serious consequences to his students.”
Fielding and the girl had been joking around and when he asked if he needed to drag her out of the classroom, she replied “Yes.” The teacher dragged her 10 to 15 feet and self-reported the incident to administrators.
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