A Michigan teacher said he resigned from his job after school officials informed him that he had to take down his pride flag.
Russell Ball, a middle school teacher with Three Rivers School District who identifies as bisexual, shared during a TikTok video that he had “tendered” his resignation after school administrators requested that he remove his pride flag, Fox 17 reported. Ball said he had already been feeling burned out from the “day-to-day demands” in his field when officials made their request.
“After 10-plus years in education, I tendered my resignation,” Ball said. “I was already feeling a high level of teacher burnout and struggling to meet the day-to-day demands of the education field.”
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“When administration came around and told me I had to take down my pride flag, I told them no,” Ball continued. “I was not going to be an active participant in the suppression and oppression of an already marginalized group that I’m a part of.”
Administrators had also asked several other teachers, who also had pride flags in their classrooms, to remove the flags, Ball said. Even after two emails were sent out, Ball stood his ground and kept his flag up, he added. One of the emails was obtained and published by WWMT.
“The pride flag stands for love, inclusion, and equality,” Ball explained, adding that the flag is not a “political statement” but “something that should be present in every single classroom across the country.”
Ball said in the video that the request from administrators made him feel like he was being “invalidated” or didn’t “belong” as a person. “That’s not a message that I want to send to myself or to any of my students.”
“Regardless of sexual orientation, sexual identity, you belong,” Ball said. “You matter. You always have a place in this world.”
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The Washington Examiner reached out to Three Rivers School District and Russell Ball for a statement but did not receive a response back.
