Teacher sacked for refusing to remove ‘have you drugged your kids today’ bumper sticker

A teacher has been fired over her bumper sticker which mocked parents who mollycoddle their children. Tarah Ausburn put the ‘Have you drugged your kid today?’ sticker on her Toyota Prius in protest at what she claims is the overmedication of today’s children. She has 60 other such stickers on the car including ‘Recycle or die’ and ‘A clear conscience is a sign of a bad memory’. Five parents at Imagine Prep High School in Surprise, Arizona, objected to the suggestion that their children were on drugs and when they complained Ms Ausburn was asked to remove it or park her car off school grounds. She refused and was fired.
The incident has sparked a huge row over first Amendment rights with Ms Ausburn refusing to back down.

She told Arizona’s KPHO TV: ‘It’s kind of a criticism of us tending to over-medicate hyperactive kids who might not need those medications.’

The Daily Mail- March 1, 2011

by Daniel Bates
March 1, 2011

Defiant: When asked, Ms Ausburn refused to take the sticker off or park the car outside so they sacked her

A teacher has been fired over her bumper sticker which mocked parents who mollycoddle their children.

Tarah Ausburn put the ‘Have you drugged your kid today?’ sticker on her Toyota Prius in protest at what she claims is the overmedication of today’s children.

She has 60 other such stickers on the car including ‘Recycle or die’
and ‘A clear conscience is a sign of a bad memory’.

Five parents at Imagine Prep High School in Surprise, Arizona, objected to the suggestion that their children were on drugs and when they complained Ms Ausburn was asked to remove it or park her car off school grounds.

She refused and was fired.

The incident has sparked a huge row over first Amendment rights with Ms Ausburn refusing to back down.

She told Arizona’s KPHO TV: ‘It’s kind of a criticism of us tending to over-medicate hyperactive kids who might not need those medications.’

She added that she ‘just likes the ability to take a controversial topic and sum it up in one clever line. I’m an English teacher, that’s what I do’.

Ms Ausburn claimed she did not share the opinions expressed on the stickers with her pupils inside the classroom and whenever a child inquired she replied that she likes to ‘express my opinions’.

Culprit: The sticker, against over medicating children, was met with backlash from parents who objected to it being in the school parking lot

Prius: Ms Ausburn's car has 60 different bumper stickers expressing several points of view but it was one sticker in particular that got her fired

She said: ‘You have to remain true to your beliefs, you have to stand up for what you believe is right and I don’t believe it’s right to censor people just because your opinion doesn’t agree with theirs.’

The story has created a huge row with many of Ms Ausburn’s students leaving comments on websites in support.

Other commentators attacked the school for clamping down on freedom of speech.

Fireofgrace wrote: ‘It’s very sad that even in our “enlightened” society, our rights can still be flagrantly violated.

‘Tarah was not teaching her beliefs in her classroom, but rather voicing them aloud on her automobile. I mistakenly believed that we were allowed to do that in this country.’

Jennifer Pashelk added: ‘What is freedom of speech if you’re not allowed to express it anywhere without consequences?

‘It’s a lie.  It was a right given to us by our founding father’s, but it was also a right that is being taken away from us by stupid people that don’t know one flipping iota about respecting the rights of others to have that freedom of self-expression.’

But among those backing the decision to fire Ms Ausburn was iflyfir who said: ‘Sorry kids, but I would have fired her too. You can’t tell me that a teacher who plasters her Prius with left-wing, socialistic propaganda, won’t express their ideologically progressive views in the classroom.’

One parent also suggested that the problems with Ms Ausburn extended beyond just the stickers.

Pamiam wrote on the KPHO website that the teacher had a ‘laundry list’
of grievances against her including insisting on being called ‘Instructor Ausburn’ instead of ‘Ms Ausburn’.

School: Officials at Imagine Prep refused to comment on accusations that sacking Ms Ausburn over the sticker was a violation of the first amendment

She also claimed that she ripped up a test and gave the student a failing grade after the student said ‘God bless you’ to her when she sneezed.

Officials at Imagine Prep High School declined to comment.
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