Teacher who taped the word ‘poop’ onto student’s arm suspended

An elementary school teacher from B.C.’s Lower Mainland has been handed a two-day suspension for incidents of professional misconduct, which included briefly taping the word “poop” onto a student’s arm.

The misconduct happened during the 2022-23 school year while Tania Jacobsen was teaching a kindergarten class in Coquitlam, according to a consent resolution agreement with the B.C. Commissioner for Teacher Regulation.

In one incident in November of that year, Jacobsen reportedly placed green painter’s tape with the word “poop” written and crossed out onto the arm of a student with “diverse abilities.”

The incident was done in front of the child’s classmates, and left the student looking “distressed, embarrassed and nearly in tears,” according to the consent agreement.

Jacobsen quickly removed the tape and told the student, “You cannot be saying that word or I might have to put this back on.”

The other incidents happened in January 2023, when the teacher was found to have “failed to appropriately supervise students under her care and supervision” twice in one day.

A fellow school employee first spotted three students in a courtyard outside Jacobsen’s classroom, with the door closed. Jacobsen later allowed a different student to go outside and grab an umbrella that was located “approximately 100 yards away from Jacobsen’s classroom, past some parked cars and outside Jacobsen’s field of vision,” according to the document.

The following month, the Coquitlam school district issued a letter of discipline to the teacher and suspended her for one day without pay.

After reviewing her conduct, the B.C. Commissioner for Teacher Regulation decided to issue an additional two-day suspension, which is scheduled to take place this December.

The commissioner considered a number of factors in the decision, including that Jacobsen “endangered the physical and emotional safety” of students, whose young age made them “particularly vulnerable.”

Jacobsen was also previously reprimanded over allegations that she slapped a disruptive student on the arm in October 2017, according to the agreement.

The commissioner credited the teacher with completing remedial work since the most recent incidents, including two workshops with the Provincial Outreach Program for Autism and Related Disorders.