Because of a video showing the student “twerking” at an off-campus dance party after homecoming, the principal of a high school in Louisiana fired the honor student who was president of the student government and took back an endorsement for her college scholarship. Many people are outraged about Kaylee Timonet’s story and have written about it on social media. They say that the video clip seems harmless because it shows her dancing with other teens at an event that her mother was in charge of.
The senior in high school is 17 years old and goes to Walker High School in Livingston Parish, which is 20 miles east of Baton Rouge. About 6,400 people live in the city. Her mother, Rachel Timonet, told the Baton Rouge TV station WAFB that her daughter was called into the principal’s office after seeing the video from the private party at the Livingston Parish Country Club on September 30. The principal’s name is Jason St. Pierre.
After the principal didn’t respond to news stories for days, Livingston Parish Public Schools released a statement on Oct. 8 from St. Pierre in which he said he was sorry to the Timonet family and would reinstate Kaylee Timonet in the student government association. In the statement, he also said that he would reinstate the scholarship endorsement. However, Rachel Timonet told WAFB that the deadline for the scholarship had already passed on October 3 and that it was “too little, too late.”
In the statement, St. Pierre also admitted that he and Kaylee Timonet talked about their religious beliefs during the meeting. As the statement said, Rachel Timonet said in a video shared in the What’s Going On In Walker, LA Facebook group that she did not have a meeting with the principal plan. There was also talk about religion, which she said began with the principal and the assistant principal.
“While that conversation was meant with the best intentions, I do understand it is not my responsibility to determine what students’ or others’ religious beliefs may – that should be the responsibility of the individual,” St. Pierre stated in the statement. She said in her video statement that she gave her daughter Bible verses and a religious bracelet.
In the video, she said, “I’ve always taught my kids not to talk about these two things.” “One is politics, and one is religion.” Rachel Timonet told WAFB that she was going to talk to lawyers about it. “This would have definitely ruined her whole senior year if the community hadn’t been there for her,” she told the TV station.
Some people on social media have said that it’s like the 1984 movie Footloose, about a teen from Chicago who moves to a small town and tries to get rid of a law that says no dancing. There were also T-shirts with the words “I stand with Kaylee Timonet” and “Let the girl dance,” which is something she has been doing since she was two years old, according to her mother.
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