Teachers suspended for barking at 9-year-old girl

Two Ohio school teachers will begin this week under suspension after they were accused of taunting and barking at a student. Meghan Montgomery says it all began in February when she received a call that her 9-year-old daughter Marissa was misbehaving in her music class at Willard K-8 School in Warren City. "Marissa told me what happened, that she was barking at the teacher and that there was other children doing it and she just joined in," said Meghan. "I told her, that's not appropriate, you don't do that." Meghan felt she took care of the problem.

"I took her home and took belongings from her and grounded her," she recalled. "And [I told her] this is not how you do this, you do not treat people like this." But she says teachers who weren't involved in the first incident, Judith Brown and Annette Constantino, began taunting Marissa. "The teachers had the whole classroom barking at her and calling her a dog and taunting her and just being mean to her," Meghan said. Marissa told her it continued to escalate.



"She says, 'Ms. Brown asked me, am I a boy or girl dog? And she asked me do I bend over and pee like this or do I stand up and pee like this and lift my leg.' I said, 'She showed you that?' And she said yeah." Meghan says the teachers apologized. "The two teachers called me and tried to justify themselves," Meghan said. "Ms. Constantino said that she was trying to let Marissa know how it felt." Meghan went to the school district. The superintendent sent letters to the teachers, suspending 11-year teacher Constantino for two days, and 16-year teacher Brown for five.

Brown received punishment for "inappropriate questioning, aggravating the situation and verbally admitting wrong to the parent." Marissa's family wants them to be fired. "I think that two-day and five-day suspension is not justifiable to what they did," Meghan said. "You are adults. How do you go and treat a child like this and you get a slap on the wrist?" "The school has adopted a zero tolerance against bullying but it seems like that only applies to the students," said Marissa's grandfather, Thomas Eldridge. The teachers suspensions begin on Monday March 5th.

With news video.