Parent defends 'tardy' teacher in viral story incident

A PARENT came to the defence of a teacher who was barred from entering the school for "tardiness".
The parent, who told China Press she witnessed the incident at a Chinese primary school in Kuala Lumpur, insisted the female teacher was not late.
Identified only by her surname, Huang, in the report, the parent said she was about to leave after dropping her child when her attention was caught by some commotion.
On checking, she saw the headmistress and two disciplinary teachers blocking the female teacher concerned at the school entrance and talking loudly to her, the daily reported today.
"The headmistress also reminded the two security personnel present not to let the teacher enter the school lest they would also be 'reprimanded'," Huang said, adding that she was sure it was only 7.15am, 15 minutes before classes began, when the incident happened.
She said she was very sure lessons had not started as there were still many parents in the school compound at the time.
On claimed by the headmistress in an earlier report that the teachers had been late quite often, Huang said it was probably not done intentionally as she was told the teacher suffered from insomnia and had to resort to sleeping pills at times.
On Tuesday, China Press front-paged the story of the teacher being barred from school.
The story, accompanied by a pix of the teacher being locked out of the classroom, said the incident went viral on social media, drawing flak from "righteous netizens" who lambasted the school for "bullying" the teacher.
However, the headmistress said the school had resorted to the drastic measure as the teacher had been late very often.
She said the incident happened in March.
Meanwhile, Education Minister Datuk Seri Mahdzir Khalid said on Tuesday that he had not received any report on the incident.