Toms River Student Forced Out Of Virtual Class Over Trump Flag – Toms River, NJ Patch

TOMS RIVER, NJ — Anthony Ribeiro says he never paid much attention to politics until the pandemic hit.

“I wasn’t into politics at all,” the 17-year-old Toms River High School North junior said Wednesday night. But a Trump banner he received as a birthday gift — and the reactions of two of his teachers to it — have brought politics home to him in ways he never anticipated.

Riberio says he was kicked out of his virtual chemistry class on Oct. 8 after he refused the teacher’s request to remove the banner hanging behind him. The next day, he was told to take the banner down during his English class. His mother, Tara Jost, said school administrators told her neither incident should have happened.

“We’re looking for an apology,” Tara Jost said. “This is not a political thing. This violated something in my home and violated my son’s learning.”

Toms River Regional School District officials did not confirm any of the details that Ribeiro shared, but said the matter is being addressed. The district has policies for students governing virtual learning, including a requirement that they not come to class in pajamas, and that they keep their computer cameras on, but nothing about political attire.

“The district is handling the matter internally,” said Michael Kenny, a district spokesman. “The student was not in violation of any general code of conduct or any policy specifically related to virtual learning. We have worked with and are continuing to work with all involved parties to resolve the issue and move forward.”

Ribeiro said he developed an interest in politics as a result of the pandemic, as he had time to research topics and talk about them with friends. The banner was a delayed birthday surprise from his aunt, and when he received it Oct. 7, he hung it right away in the living room, which has been his study area for virtual learning since school restarted in September.

The chemistry class was his last class of the day on Oct. 8, Ribeiro said, and as he does for every class, he signed in early. The chemistry teacher looked up and saw him and the banner, and asked Ribeiro to take it down, but Ribeiro said he ignored the request. When the teacher was taking attendance, he again told Ribeiro to take it down.

“The third time he said, ‘If you’re not going to take it down, you’re going to have to leave my class for the day,’ ” Ribeiro said. So Ribeiro waved goodbye left the class, and told his mother what happened.

“I was very shocked,” Jost said. She called the high school and spoke to an administrator, asking him whether a student could be kicked out of an in-person class if they came in wearing a Trump or a Biden T-shirt. The administrator said “absolutely not,” she said.

The next morning, Ribeiro’s English teacher asked him to take the banner down — after apparently not noticing it on Oct. 8.

“I joined class early, and she was talking to another student, asking him to keep politics out of her classroom,” he said. That student had been wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat in class, he said.

On Oct. 9, when she asked Ribeiro to remove the Trump banner from behind him, Ribeiro complied, then called his mother who was coming home from taking her other son to school.

“I was very angry at him” for taking down the banner,” Jost said. “I told him to put it back up.”

But she said her son was concerned that refusing to take it down would have had a negative impact on his grades.

“He’s very serious about his academics,” Jost said. A short time later, an assistant superintendent called to say the matter was being addressed with all of the staff, and Jost told her about the English teacher’s request.

” ‘As soon as I get home it’s going back up,’ I told her,” Jost said. Most of her frustration is directed at the chemistry teacher, however.

“I just don’t think it was handled the right way, she said. “He got kicked out for something in my home. He wasn’t waving the flag in (the teacher’s) face, it was just in the background.”

“These teachers should teach their subject and not go off the subject,” Jost said. “These kids have enough to deal with, especially this year.”

The Toms River schools started the school year with fully remote learning due to staffing issues. The youngest students — preschool through first-graders — began a hybrid schedule Oct. 5, and second- through sixth-graders will be hybrid starting Oct. 26. The middle and high schools are scheduled to start hybrid instruction Nov. 9.

Ribeiro said the two teachers involved had spoken about politics before last week, with the chemistry teacher saying he would be voting for the Democrats and that the Republicans disregarded science with regard to climate change. But their reactions to the banner still surprised him.

“I didn’t know what to think,” he said, particularly about being singled out in front of classmates. But Ribeiro said he has received a lot of support from classmates — both supporters of Joe Biden and of Donald Trump — over the teachers asking him to remove the banner.

“A lot of people have told me what they did was wrong,” Ribeiro said.

Jost said she has seen a similar sentiment from people responding on socal media.

“There are a lot of comments where people say, ‘I’m not a Trump supporter but this is wrong,’ ” she said. “I appreciate that.”

Ribeiro said the incident hasn’t made him more strongly support Trump.

“It’s just opened my eyes,” he said. “There’s been multiple people like me and this gave me a firsthand experience” with the intensity of the emotions around the 2020 election.

“Everybody needs to accept everybody and their opinions,” Ribeiro said.

“To me that (politics) is not what it’s about,” Jost said. “This was about something in my home.”

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