The professor wanted to talk to his high school students “about the world they live in”, a few days after a shooting at an elementary school in Nashville.
By NJ with AFP
© Frederic Mery Poplimont / MAXPPP / Maxppp/MAXPPP
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VS’is an unusual duty that cost him his job. This week, an American psychology professor had given the only instructions to his high school students: “Today was the last day of your life, write your obituary. Jeffrey Keene, 63, was fired from his facility near Orlando, Florida. In a press release, the school authorities accuse him of having given “inappropriate homework” to his students.
On his Facebook page, he explained that he wanted to link his course to an exercise intended to prepare students for the risk of an armed individual entering their school, a few days after a young woman killed three children and three adults. at an elementary school in Nashville. The professor thus asked his students to write down their “impressions” linked to this simulation and to reflect on the causes of the repetition of the killings in the United States, on their possible remedies and therefore, to imagine their post-mortem biography. .
Since 2020, 4,368 minors killed by firearms
“Stunned” by his dismissal, he defended himself on local television. “I spoke to the students about the world in which they live, about firearms, shooters…” And if he decided to give this assignment, “it wasn’t to scare them or make them think that they were going to die, but to help them understand what is important in their lives”. During the homework, a small note specified: “thank you for being aware […] that it is absolutely not a question of disturbing you”.
In a country regularly plagued by gun killings, the issue is a real sea serpent and a majority of Americans remain very attached to the right to bear a gun and do not want to hear about reforms. Recently, two elected officials from Tennessee were expelled from the local parliament for joining demonstrators who came to the hemicycle to demand better regulations on firearms after the Nashville massacre.
Since 2020, firearms have been the leading cause of death for American minors (4,368 deaths), ahead of road accidents and overdoses, according to the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC). And if the killings in the school environment represent only a tiny part of it, they mark more the spirits and relaunch, incessantly, the debate on the carrying of arms.