Reinstate Ben Frisch at Friends Seminary

It has come to our attention as alumni of Friends Seminary that the school is firing Ben Frisch for making an inappropriate joke in class. We hear from good sources that the school had agreed that Ben apologize to his class and attend a conference on teaching the Holocaust. We have all had Ben as a teacher for either math or Quakerism. I think we all can agree that whatever happened, Ben's intentions were not malicious or bigoted. He has always been devoted to Quaker principles of nonviolence and fighting injustice and has not a hateful bone in his body. It sounds like he found himself in an awkward situation and made an awkward joke.

The following was posted on Facebook by a fellow alumna:

Hello all! I imagine some of you have heard about the situation with Ben Frisch right now. For those who haven't: Ben, while demonstrating an angle in a math class, made an obviously ill-advised joke by mocking a Nazi salute and saying "Heil Hitler" in a German accent. Ben is now suspended and his employment will possibly be terminated.

My brother is a current ninth grader at Friends, and he told me a bit about the reaction from the student body -- overwhelmingly, as I understand it, Jewish students are not offended and want Ben to stay, while students of color are saying that there have been other racist incidents at the school that have not caused such an uproar.

As a Jew and a former student myself, I strongly believe that Ben should apologize but not be fired. **Moreover, I believe that terminating Ben's employment will do absolutely nothing for the real issues of racist treatment of students that go unnoticed or unreported.**