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Art Teacher Suspended For Showing Students Art

Jill

No, really. The issue, of course, is that the teacher took the students to a museum where there were — gasp — nudes.

But Ms. McGee, 51, a popular art teacher with 28 years in the classroom, is out of a job after leading her fifth-grade classes last April through the Dallas Museum of Art. One of her students saw nude art in the museum, and after the child’s parent complained, the teacher was suspended.

Although the tour had been approved by the principal, and the 89 students were accompanied by 4 other teachers, at least 12 parents and a museum docent, Ms. McGee said, she was called to the principal the next day and “bashed.”

She later received a memorandum in which the principal, Nancy Lawson, wrote: “During a study trip that you planned for fifth graders, students were exposed to nude statues and other nude art representations.” It cited additional complaints, which Ms. McGee has challenged.

The school board suspended her with pay on Sept. 22.

27 thoughts on Art Teacher Suspended For Showing Students Art

  1. I’d like to know more about these “performance concerns”. Seems to me that this is just CYA on the part of the principal and the district; if all they’ve got is complaints about Ms. McGee’s footwear and the alleged fact that she doesn’t display enough student work (however one evaluates that), it seems to me it’s all about appeasing some parent who’s threatening to raise a stink. The fact that Ms. McGee’s been teaching for 28 years and apparently has had no negative reviews in that time until just now is pretty telling.

  2. No, no. It wasn’t about the nude art. She wore flip-flops — sandals, Jill, sandals — and this trip was very poorly planned even though the school approved it long before they left. Duh.

  3. I submit that it is impossible to go to an art museum and not see a nude.

    Btw, I’ve lived in Dallas, and been the DMA many times. They have an awesome furniture collection (ok, no nudes in that part). The DMA is in no way rife with nudes. I think there is a big, Henry Moore, reclining nudge near the entrance, but that’s hardly a playboy centerfold.

  4. Boing Boing mentioned this last week. In fact, the email from the district to a Boing Boing reader appears to be the one “sourced” (but not attributed) in the NY Times article.

    If there’s any truth to the teacher’s claims, then it’s just outrageous. Her employer should have backed her against the complaining parent. The parent signed the permission slip. Everyone expects nude art in museums (or they should). Anyhow, here’s the Boing Boing link:

    http://tinyurl.com/pbaq7

  5. Now the bit about “It cited additional concerns” made me pause for a second, but according to the article, these turn out to be:

    “In the May 18 memorandum to Ms. McGee, Ms. Lawson faulted her for not displaying enough student art and for “wearing flip-flops” to work; Ms. McGee said she was wearing Via Spiga brand sandals. In citing the students’ exposure to nude art, Ms. Lawson also said “time was not used wisely for learning during the trip . . .””

  6. Seems to me more kids would be enthusiastic about art class if they knew nudes would be involved.

    I think there is a big, Henry Moore, reclining nudge near the entrance

    Easily my favorite typo of the week.

  7. If the parents who complained ever get into the Sistine Chapel, they better not look up. They might die from the shock.

  12. The lengthy response from the principal (in the Boing Boing post) makes it sound like there was a lot more going on than just a simple “OMG NUDES!!” reaction; the Times doesn’t have nearly as much on that end.

  13. “The lengthy response from the principal (in the Boing Boing post) makes it sound like there was a lot more going on than just a simple “OMG NUDES!!” reaction”

    The feel I get from it is either
    a) it’s the nudes, or
    b) the principal had decided, some time ago, that the teacher was going to go. Hey kids, V is for Vendetta.

    Really, school politics can make good ol’ Karl Rove look like a sweet, naive little lamb.

  16. Welcome to Dallas. For reasons such as this and others, we have left the public school system here and are homeschooling our daughter. People such as the one (!) parent who complained are hijacking the public school system here and we voted with our feet.

  17. …. you mean we aren’t born sporting business casual and Italian loafers/pumps?! I’ve been lied to for so long! *wail* It’s like when those wimmin put their dirty pillows on the magazines and scar my delicate retinas. I never had my mouth on no dirty pillow when I was a young’un! Sure, breast milk is supposed to have all these “health benefits”, but consider my sensitive virgin retinas!!! There was always at least a sturdy support bra and a tasteful blouse between me and them boobies! To this day, wimmin without bras send me into seizures. You have no idea how complicated this makes bathing, but I manage.

    Exposing children to teh nekkid… next thing you know, they’ll find all that uncovered and unmade-up skin beautiful and natural and not shameful!

  18. dante would have written a hell for these people in which they are peeled like onions.

    # Natalia Says:
    October 1st, 2006 at 5:23 pm

    What the fuck is wrong with this country…?

    you and me both, sister…………………………….

  19. The principal approved the field trip, the parents signed the permission slip, and it’s the teacher’s fault how? Isn’t that the point of permission slips, was she supposed to visit each individual child’s home to make sure the parents were smart enough to realize museums conatin representations of the human form before signing?

  20. So I take it that parental consent to attend a field trip is no longer necessary? We used to get these little forms we had to have our parents sign (usually with an accompanying bus fee) before we’d be allowed to go on a field trip.

  22. We used to get these little forms we had to have our parents sign (usually with an accompanying bus fee) before we’d be allowed to go on a field trip.

    All the parents signed a consent form but apparently it never occured to them that there may be nudes in a museum.

  23. Being of the cautious type, I won’t say “all art is OK for kids” because clearly there is a segment of modern and ancient art which probably isn’t suitable for kids (mapplethorpe and kama sutra, for example)

    Being of the “suspicious of right wing loonies” type, I’d almost guess this as a trap–they’re just waiting for some prominent liberal to say “there’s nothing wrong with art!” so they can happily trot out a Mapplethorpe or a Japanese pillow book and bring up the funding/moral reprehensibility trope argument again.

    I am not surprised that someone, somewhere, got annoyed. After all, much art was intended to be highly appealing–and sometimes erotic. The fact that things are made of marble doesn’t change the probability that for some stuents, this may have been the anatomically correct man/woman they were entitled to stare at openly. Paticularly in Texas.

    Given our society’s unfortunate move towards prudery and concealment it is not entirely surprising that this would happen. People are very strange.

    Sigh….

  24. So I went back and read the Boing Boing link; maybe it is just coincidental timing, but I’m still suspicious given how vague the “performance concerns” are. Now maybe for legal and ethical reasons the district and the principal can’t reveal the whole of these concerns, but it’s difficult for me to imagine that a teacher with 28 years experience would all of a sudden be a problem. Possible? Sure. My sense is that something else is going on here.

  25. I just realized that I’m wearing keds. I’m pretty sure this means I can’t teach kids how to decide if characters are round or flat.

  26. THis poor teacher lives in a small Texas town and has had her LIVELIHOOD destroyed !!! Hint: there probably aren’t any comparable jobs for her, and it is unlikely she can move away; her entire family lives there. Her life is going to be DESTROYED because of some fundie asswipe!!

    What can we do to Help her? Anything?

  27. How much pressure can a bunch of unrelated internet nerds put on the school district?

    No, really. I’m serious. Would writing to them help any? I mean, good grief! Isn’t the fifth grade about when they start showing them the “Your Changing Body” type filmstrips/films/pamphlets anyway? Granted, that’s a little different from encountering a glorious Greek nude in an art museum. I know which one I’d have preferred at that age. (What can I say? I’ve always been awed by ancient art. 🙂

    Even my ex-Catholic first mom taught me that the human body is beautiful, and there is nothing wrong with it. If SHE got that, I figured anyone could. But I guess that woman was just SO far ahead of her time in so many, many ways….

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