Deyshia Hargrave is an English teacher at Rene Rost Middle Schools in Vermilion Parish, Louisiana; on Monday night, she attended a special meeting of the local school board and, when called upon comment period, politely asked why the board superintendants had voted themselves a raise while the teachers in the school district have been subjected to a long-term pay-freeze.
The superintendent ruled her question out of order and then a deputy Abbeville city marshal who works in the parish schools dragged her out of the room, put her in handcuffs and threw her to the floor while chanting "stop resisting."
The board of education says it won't press charges against her. However, the city is holding her on charges of "remaining after being forbidden" and "resisting an officer."
When the Vermillion Parish School Board in Vermillion Parish, Louisiana, was voting on its superintendent's contract, which included a raise, Deyshia Hargrave, an English teacher at Rene Rost Middle School in Kaplan, stood up to ask why the superintendent was getting a raise while teachers hadn't gotten one in years."We work very hard with very little to maintain the salaries that we have," she said. "How are you going to take that money?…It's basically taking out of the pocket of teachers."
After a back and forth between the school board and Hargrave, a marshal led her out of the room and arrested her, putting her in handcuffs on the floor of a nearby hallway and leading her out of the building. She was booked into jail on Monday night, according to a spokesperson from the Abbeville Police Department, but had been released as of Tuesday.
Louisiana Teacher Put in Jail After Asking Questions About Poor Salary, Superintendent's Raise [Melina Delkic/Newsweek]
