Teacher is barred after having pupils draw male genitalia in class



YONKERS, N.Y. (AP) -- A teacher has been barred from classes for having his seventh-graders draw male genitalia on the blackboard during health class, school officials say.
The teacher, whose name was not made public, was assigned to administrative duties and Superintendent Bernard Pierorazio will ask trustees to fire him, Yonkers schools spokeswoman Jerilynne Fierstein said Friday.
"There was no way we were going to let him be in front of children," she said.
Pierorazio said the teacher opened a lesson on human anatomy and sexuality by asking pupils in a class of boys and girls to volunteer to come to the board to draw male anatomy.
Fierstein said the state's seventh-grade curriculum calls for the anatomy lessons but "as a teacher you have to be sensitive and you have to look at the age-appropriateness of any activity that you ask a child to do. And this was just not appropriate."
Fierstein said the administration learned of the drawings at the Pearls Hawthorne school when a parent complained.
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