A Florida Atlantic University professor is on forced leave after asking students to stomp on pieces of paper labelled “Jesus.”
Deandre Poole, who taught a class on intercultural communications at the university, has been suspended from teaching classes, keeping office hours, and being present on campus, according to the Miami Herald.
The activity required students to write “Jesus” on paper and after a period of reflection, stomp on it, according to the Herald. They were then supposed to discuss how that made them feel.
The classroom activity left members of the community in an uproar, and even caused Florida governor Rick Scott to write a letter to the university asking them to investigate. In the letter he wrote that he was “deeply disappointed” by the incident and expected an investigation and a full report, according to NBC.
“As we enter the week memorializing the events of Christ’s passion, this incident gave me great concern over the lessons we are teaching our students,” Scott wrote, according to NBC.
Zeba Crook, an associate religion professor at Carleton University, said he thinks the professor’s activity was “perfectly valid.”
“It was, as far as I can tell, intended to make students think about what makes them uncomfortable, and to get a discussion going about that,” Crook said via email.
Crook said if the situation called for it, he would even hold a similar activity in his class. He said he believes that writing the name Jesus on a piece of paper does not suddenly make it something “magical and holy.”
The issue of stomping on the word Jesus was brought to the school’s attention after one student, Ryan Rotela, refused to participate and was suspended from all class activities, according to NBC.
Rotela is a devout Mormon and told the NBC that he claims he was punished for refusing to participate in the activity.
The university released a statement saying that Poole had been put on leave for safety reasons. According to the Daily Caller, the school was worried for Poole’s safety after he allegedly received death threats.
The university also sent out an email apologizing for any harm Poole’s actions may have caused.
“I’ve never seen anything like it on campus, the vitriol that has been released on this guy,” Chris Robe, assistant professor of communications and faculty union president, told the Sun Sentinel.
Scott seemed dissatisfied with the apology. He said it was “in many ways inconsequential to the larger issue of a professor’s poor judgment.”
But Crook said religion shouldn’t be held to different standards than other fields of study.
“Universities are no longer religious institutions. We operate outside of the church (and synagogue and mosque) power. Religion is not to be treated as some delicate sacred object in a university,” he wrote.
“Religion can and should be treated as no different from economics or politics.”
High school’s honours English teacher Scott Compton resigned the same day as Poole’s leave from the university.
Compton stomped on the American flag in his classroom, and said he wanted to teach his students that the flag was just a symbolic piece of cloth, according to the Daily Caller.
Compton was fired in December due to the incident, but had been fighting his dismissal.
Still, Crook said he doesn’t believe Poole should have been fired.
“Universities are not the place to tip-toe around everyone’s little insecurities and sensitivities,” he said.
“I show the Mohammed cartoons in my intro to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam course (and have been for 5 years) despite the fact that they caused worldwide riots about 7 years ago,” he said. “If you can’t do that in a university, and talk about it, then universities might as well shut the doors, turn the lights off, and go home.”
