First govt school teacher struck off over protests

Two more teachers have been disqualified over complaints sparked by the social unrest in 2019, raising the total number to four.

And for the first time, a teacher from a government school has been struck off.

The liberal studies teacher, who is understood to have taught at Lung Cheung Government Secondary School in Wong Tai Sin, is accused of committing professional misconduct.

According to papers by the Education Bureau to Legco, the teacher was accused of “defaming the country, arousing students’ hostility towards the country and the Chinese people, and undermining their sense of national identity”.

“[The] teacher continuously used a large amount of one-sided and biased teaching materials. The contents included political issues that were still developing, contents without support by evidence or even distorted facts,” the bureau alleged.

The Professional Teachers Union said it’s been helping the teacher, who objects to the allegations.

It says there’s no further comment because the teacher has not yet been officially notified.

In another case, the bureau said a teacher was de-registered this month due to a court conviction for engaging in unlawful activities related to the protests.

Officials did not specify what the offence was.

Last year, two primary school teachers had their registration cancelled, one for allegedly “promoting Hong Kong independence” and the other for allegedly “seriously teaching his history lessons wrong”. Both of them have filed appeals.

Two other teachers have been sacked by their schools after court convictions, and officials will make a decision about their licenses later.

The Education Bureau also noted that some people have proposed offering a level of punishment between life disqualification and reprimand because that gap appears to be “too wide”.

The bureau said it will consider allowing those who were disqualified to try and register again after a certain period of time, which it said could be three years.

Beijing officials have repeatedly stressed that the education sector is among those that have to “learn from past mistakes”, with the director of the Hong Kong and Macau Office, Xia Baolong, saying last month that the sector’s “not yet fully governed by patriots”.