Teacher reportedly tore Black Lives Matter posters

An elite Christchurch private school is investigating after students reported that a teacher tore down posters and verbally abused them for promoting the Black Lives Matter movement. The students at St Andrew’s College, in Strowan, were raising awareness about the movement last week. They said they were shocked when a female staff member ripped down posters and stamped on them while swearing at the Year 13 students. One of the students, who did not want to be identified, said the posters were put up on Wednesday and began disappearing soon after they were put up. The student said the group received permission from senior management to put up the posters.

The following day, the group of four friends printed out about 100 more posters after their previous work was torn down. ‘‘I went back with two students and we went to the science block in our school and as we were walking up the stairs, my friend happened to place a poster up on the wall and the teacher walked around the corner and basically went berserk at us.’’ He said the teacher began swearing at the students. ‘‘She ripped off the poster, stamped on it [and] threw it down the stairs,’’ the student said.

The student said the staff member talked about how she hated the posters, how she thought the students were doing it as a joke, and they did not know what they were talking about. ‘‘Frankly, we were confused by her messages, these posters were actually made by my friend who is a person of colour, and I’m just trying to amplify their voice around our school community and for us to be put down like that and verbally abused like that was really disheartening.’’

St Andrew’s College rector Christine Leighton said the school was committed to ‘‘treating all people equally and fairly’’. ‘‘The behaviour witnessed by students towards the end of last week is under investigation and therefore it would be inappropriate to make any comment while this process is under way,’’ she said.