A student’s suspension from school almost never makes the news. Unless that student was suspended for refusing to stomp on Jesus.
That's what junior Ryan Rotela alleges happened to him at Florida Atlantic University.
In an interview with CBS 12 News, Rotela described an exercise in which he and his classmates where instructed by his Intercultural Communications professor, Dr. Deandre Poole, to take out a piece of paper, write the word “JESUS” on it, lay it on the floor, and stomp on it.
“I said to the professor, ‘With all due respect to your authority as a professor, I just do not believe what you told us to do was appropriate, I believe it was unprofessional, and I was deeply offended by what you told me to do.’…. If you were to stomp on the word ‘Jesus,’ it says that the word has no value.”
Rotela is a self-proclaimed, very religious Mormon who goes to church every Sunday.
According to Rotela, he went to Poole’s supervisor, an associate professor at FAU, two days later and found out he was suspended from the class.
“I truly see this as, you know, I’m being punished," he said. "And… I’m still waiting for an apology from somebody."
FAU released a statement to CBS 12:
"Faculty and students at academic institutions pursue knowledge and engage in open discourse,” it said. “While at times the topics discussed may be sensitive, a university environment is a venue for such dialogue and debate.”
The school did not say whether or not the teacher would be disciplined. The university said Poole was just participating in an exercise. According to FAU, the exercise is from a textbook called "Intercultural Communication: A Contextual Approach, 5th Edition.”
According to Salon.com, FAU was in the middle of another controversy a couple months ago when a professor reportedly said crisis actors were used at the Sandy Hook shooting.
