Missouri high school teacher loses job for allegedly teaching Critical Race Theory

A Missouri high school English teacher did not have her contract renewed amid accusations that she implemented Critical Race Theory in the classroom.

The school board for the 400-person district in southwest Missouri voted last month to not renew the contract of Greenfield High School teacher Kim Morrison, the Springfield News-Leader reported.

Morrison said she was called into the principals' office in February after she assigned students a 15-question worksheet titled "How Racially Privileged Are You?" for the young adult novel "Dear Martin."

"That first meeting, when she showed me that she had a copy of the handout and she wanted to know the context, she said the people she's hearing from said that this is CRT," Morrison told the News-Leader. "I said 'Well, it's not CRT. I don't know what CRT is because I didn't go to law school and we didn't cover it in grad school. This isn't it."

CRT teaches that racism "pervades society and is fostered and perpetuated by the legal system," as defined by Merriam-Webster. Under Critical Race Theory, students are also taught "whether they will be oppressors or oppressed," Just the News reported.

"I said discussing racism is not CRT and she said she understood but that this is what she is hearing," Morrison said, recalling the meeting with the principal.

She defended the worksheet, which she said she bought from an instructional database.

"It was to prepare students for the conversation that was going to happen between two characters that we were about to read," she said.

The superintendent wrote a letter on behalf of the board explaining to Morrison why her contract was not renewed while she was in her fourth year of teaching at Greenfield.

Superintendent Chris Kell said her contract would not be renewed because of her "decision to incorporate the worksheet associated with the novel 'Dear Martin,' due to the content and subject matter."

Kell told the News-Leader that the school board is not likely to reconsider the decision.

"I would think at this point it is a done deal. It was a board vote," he said. "They are the ones that do the hiring, the non-renewals. It was their vote."

Morrison was up for tenure this year. Her husband, Darren Morrison, resigned from the school board after the vote. 

She said she would teach the book again, but not the worksheet that led to her losing her job. 

The English teacher also wants to finish the school year strong. 

"We're only in the beginning of the fourth quarter," she said. "I am not cheating these kids."