A Maryland college instructor who was underneath investigation after sharing a viral video of scholars taking out his braided coiffure revealed in a social media update that he was in the end suspended for 5 days,
As beforehand reported, Marquise White of the Maya Angelou French Immersion Faculty in Hillcrest Heights, Maryland, shared a TikTok livestream on Might 5 by which just a few college students eliminated his braids.
The video led to an investigation, throughout which a Prince George’s County Faculty District spokesperson informed PEOPLE that White had been “reassigned out of the classroom.”
White has since revealed in a 7-minute-long TikTok posted on July 6 that he has been suspended, which CBS affiliate WUSA reported he discovered to be an “acceptable” punishment.
“On the finish of the day, I did break a coverage and I do take accountability for that,” White informed the native information outlet in an interview.
In his July 6 TikTok clip to his greater than 780,000 followers, White stated, “I made a mistake…Regardless of having the mother and father’ approval to have their college students featured in my social media movies, the county nonetheless is sort of in opposition to placing college students on social media, which is comprehensible.”
“For that motive, I am being positioned on a 5-day suspension with out pay. However I am not fired. I used to be by no means fired. The county got here out and stated he was reassigned, I used to be simply reassigned to my home. They needed to examine the issues folks had been saying about me,” White stated, including that some folks on social media made “baseless” claims about him in response to the clip.
The Prince George’s County Faculty District informed PEOPLE in a press release on Thursday, July 11, that “the investigation is full and the instructor stays a PGCPS [Prince George’s County Public Schools] worker.”
Chatting with WUSA, the district added that it couldn’t touch upon confidential personnel issues.
White didn’t instantly reply to PEOPLE’s request for extra touch upon Thursday.
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Whereas White shared in his new video that he was initially “actually bothered” on the size of time it took for the choice to be made, he thanked the county for “taking their time and making certain that I wasn’t an precise weirdo” earlier than he was “allowed again into the classroom.”
“Folks had been calling me all the pieces underneath the solar. Making baseless claims and allegations and accusations in opposition to me,” he stated. “… After an extended, intensive and arduous investigation, they did not discover something. Let me repeat that, they by no means discovered something.”
As beforehand famous, White’s video prompted viewers to each defend and criticize his actions as an teacher. The district’s code of conduct reads that college shouldn’t report college students’ faces and voices until they’re educating a performing arts or profession know-how schooling class, and that college “should respect college students’ private boundaries by sustaining correct area and display acceptable behaviors.”
White additionally stated in his TikTok replace that his “entire total college group” was supporting him amid the investigation, together with mother and father, college students, employees and administration.
“That being stated, I wish to thank everybody and categorical my honest gratitude to those that did not run with their assumptions or generalizations or make baseless claims based mostly off one thing you’ve got seen on the web,” White stated.
“I will be again on the college in August, doing what I do greatest,” White shared on the finish of his video. “Making studying enjoyable and impacting the lives of numerous college students.”
