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Kim Johnson ReportingStudents of East Hollywood High were truant this morning. Instead of going to class, they stayed outside their arts-oriented charter school to protest. They were angry about a popular teacher being fired.
Officials at East Hollywood say the teacher was put on administrative leave last Friday and fired yesterday for allowing, encouraging, and participating in an inappropriate game of conversation during class. The school's director tells us there was no inappropriate contact, but very inappropriate things were said, and parents complained.
Students who didn't know the reason for the firing reacted angrily.
"We're not going to school without Nathan. Who's Nathan? The best teacher in the world. They fired him for no reason. He taught history of film."
East Hollywood's director, Eric Lindsey tried to calm the students and explain why the teacher was fired.
Eric Lindsey: "I like Nathan. I think Nathan is a good teacher. But he went beyond the bounds in a public school setting. If you want to continue on with this, I promise you Nathan will be very disappointed because I believe information that will come out will be very harmful to him. So you are in a very real sense causing harm to the very person you are trying to support."
Eric Lindsey was able to talk the students into returning to class where he further explained what happened, and why the school had no choice but to let the teacher go.