Woodcliff Lake, NJ – A Woodcliff Middle School history teacher is suing the school district after he was suspended for using swastikas during a history lesson about Nazi Germany’s lead, Adolf Hitler.
Robert Walsh, 53, of Park Ridge filed a lawsuit against the Woodcliff Lake School District has accused him of bullying, harassment and intimidation during his lesson about World War II and Adolf Hitler. In that lesson, he taught students about the short rise and fall of the Nazi empire and asked students to create a nazi-propaganda style poster.
Walsh says he was only teaching students about the dangers and influence of totalitarian-style government and explained how the Nazi party of Germany commandeered the swastika, which once represented good luck in Hinduism.
The history teacher said he wanted to teach the students how the Nazis used propaganda to influence the population in Germany to follow and support their greater atrocities and the danger of government-based political propaganda.
Walsh was told that Jewish residents in town were complaining to the district about his lesson plan.
He was suspended on February 7th and remains suspended by the district. Walsh now claims the district has tarnished his reputation as both a citizen and teacher, branding him as ‘pro-Hitler’.