Teacher With Asperger's Syndrome Faces Firing After Teasing

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What do you guys think of this? Does this guy really have Asperger's Syndrome and is it good that they want to get rid of him?




Teacher With Asperger's Syndrome Faces Firing After Teasing Overweight Student

People with Asperger's syndrome can often come across as socially inept. This makes them ideally suited for careers as high school math teachers or journalists.

Robert Wollkind chose to be a math teacher. He blames the condition for the trouble he's in after asking a fat kid if he ate his homework. The student had apparently been teased for his weight before.

Now Wolkkind, who teaches at Brookfield High School in Connecticut, is fighting for his job. The Hartford Courant reports he has been on administrative leave since November and faces a termination hearing next week.

School district officials tell the paper this is not the first time the math teacher has been running his mouth with his brain in neutral. They claim he has made a string of demeaning remarks over his 32-year career. He even told a student he hated him.

Wollkind claims he has Asperger's syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism, which makes it difficult for him to read other people's emotions and respond appropriately.

The Hartford Courant reports more than 1,000 parents and students have signed a petition defending him.

http://www.parentdish.com/2011/03/31/as ... in-adults/

There is no excuse for teachers to ridicule students in public or to tease them publicly or privately. Having Asperger's is no excuse. If he can't behave himself, then he has no business being around students.

Wolkkind should be fired immediately.

Asperger's is no excuse for this.

It appears that it is too late to fire him.

This is an old story and he has already resigned.

From nearly a year and a half ago, http://www.newstimes.com/news/article/Embattled-Brookfield-teacher-Doc-Wollkind-2136002.php:

This sounds like someone with Asperger's who doesn't know social boundaries. I think that most people with Asperger's Syndrome don't fit as a teacher. My father was a teacher too but when he made jokes in which he acted like he was going to punish someone while he didn't mean it like that, he made a kid cry because he isn't very good at social interaction. In the profession of a teacher this is important.

Besides of that I think that joking is one of the most difficult things for people with Asperger's Syndrome. For some reason I think the joke itself of someone eating his/her homework while he/she isn't thin seems funny, the problem is that this isn't a comedy serie and that this is a real person, that's why it's inappropriate and wrong, but I think the joke itself is a funny one, although it should be only used in a comedy serie.

I have experienced some problems with jokes I made too which were misinterpreted because I didn't understand the social interaction, so I stopped with that. This teacher doesn't seem to even realise that he does something wrong and doesn't stop with it.

A few comments from students, http://www.ratemyteachers.com/robert-wollkind/252041-t/1:

Unfortunately all sorts of people have Aspergers Syndrome - nice ones as well as highly unpleasant ones like this man - he deserves to be sacked in my opinion as there's no place for a teacher who makes such demeaning comments to anyone in the workplace and he either needs to learn that lesson or not bother working.

Teachers like this are a pet peeve of mine. I absolutely will not tolerate teachers who poke fun at their students.

For what it's worth, my high school math teacher, Upchurch, was notorious for his poor performance with students. He enjoyed poking fun at students. I guess that he thought that made him cool or something.

He didn't like my family for some reason. When my second oldest brother was in school, he was overweight, and Upchurch would poke fun at him. I have many memories of my sister complaining about how Upchurch would tease my brother.

When I was in high school, Upchurch set out to flunk me out of his class. He did not want me in his class at all. The school had three six week periods each semester. I made C's the first two six weeks, an F the third six weeks (I had the mumps for a week and he refused to let me make up any work I missed), and an A on the semester exam! From then on, I made A's the rest of the time.

It wasn't until years later that I found out what happened. My father went to the school and talked to Upchurch. He told Upchurch that he wasn't going to sit by and let him continue what he was doing. I don't know if the threats were physical threats or legal threats, but whatever they were, Upchurch stopped trying to flunk me out of his class.

When my younger brother was in the class, Upchurch assured my parents that my younger brother was doing well in the class and then flunked him for the semester forcing him to repeat the class the next year. His mistake was that he also did that to another kid who's father was on the school board. Upchurch got the boot and never taught in a high school again.

If I had kids and I found out that one of their teachers was acting like Upchurch did or in any other inappropriate way, I would raise hell with the school system including lawsuits against both the school and the teacher. The teacher could look forward to paying his legal bills well into his retirement.

If someone can't behave themselves in front of the classroom, then they shouldn't be in front of the classroom.

Although he may have AS (if someone claims it, then I assume it true), if he got through college and has been teaching for thirty years, then he would not make those mistakes honestly. He should have learned enough to avoid insulting others long before this.

He is either using his AS as an excuse to say whatever he pleases or else he has a severe personality disorder on top of the AS that's causing the problem.

It looks bad when you suddenly bring up AS when things go wrong. The best way to deal with those situations is to apologize to those who were affected, accept responsibility and admit your mistake.

Teaching isn't the best choice for him if he can't bother working on his people skills. So he is resigning. Good choice he is finally making.