Middle School Teacher Gives Students This Math Test — Then Gets Placed On Leave
Every parent’s worst nightmare is that their child will be exposed to something harmful in the place they’re meant to be safe — at school.
Well, at Cranford Burns Middle School in Mobile, Alabama, that fear came to life. A teacher, now identified as JoAnne Bolser, distributed a math test to her students. But when one boy read the first question, he found himself angry and disturbed.
And that first question? It read, “Ramón has an AK-47 with a 30-round clip. He usually misses 6 out of every 10 shots and he uses 13 rounds per drive-by shooting. How many drive-by shootings can Ramón attempt before he has to steal enough ammunition and reload?”
The test didn’t stop at drive-by shootings. Other questions included references to drugs, pimps, and other crimes. Among the 10 problems were questions such as:
“Raul wants to cut the pound of cocaine he bought for $40,000 to make a 20% profit. How many one ounce bags will he need to make to obtain the 20% profit?”
“Dwayne pimps three hos. If the price is $85 per trick, how many tricks per day must each ho turn to support Dwayne’s $800 per day crack habit?”
The appalled student took a photo of his math test and texted it to his mother. His mother, Erica Hall, was so outraged that she was going to call the police, but she ended the call and decided to approach the school instead. When the school caught wind of what happened, Bolser was placed on administrative leave.
Not only were the test questions inappropriate in terms of their content, but Hall was especially angry about the racial aspect of the questions. Most of the students are minorities, and the questions referencing drugs and criminal activity used names stereotypically associated with minorities such as Desmond, Pedro, and LaShaunda.
Supposedly, the test is an old joke that has been around since the 80s, and Bolser isn’t the first teacher to be called out for it. However, parents did not find this to be a credible excuse.
“While some of the kids may know what these terms mean, they shouldn’t have to be flooded with them from school administrators and teachers,” said another parent, Jason Boyington. “At some point somebody’s got to take a stand for righteousness and I think the ball got dropped on this big time.”
