Professional wrestler turned high school science teacher Dean Liptak has been suspended for using an illegal cell phone jammer in his class.
Anyone in any of the “older than high school kid” generations have no doubt said something along the lines of “kids these days spend too much time on their damn phones” at some point. I know I certainly have, and I can hardly imagine how frustrating it must be for the fine teachers of the world who have to try and get these kids to focus on their studies. The frustration of trying to teach people who are constantly glued to their phones proved too much for professional wrestler turned high school science teacher Dean Liptak, who utilized some kind of home-made cell phone jammer in his classes.
Liptak has been suspended without pay for five days following the incident, which the school board’s superindentent described as an exercise in “poor judgement” which “posed a serious risk to critical safety communications as well as the possibility of preventing others from making 9-1-1 calls.”
In his defense, Liptak stated that he never intended his device to be used for malicious means, and he could have switched it off at any time should an emergency arise. “My intent for using the device was to keep students academically focused on schoolwork. It is counter productive to stop instruction and lose academic focus when I have to tell a student to put his or her cell phone away.”
The Federal Communications Commission, states that “federal law prohibits the operation, marketing, or sale of any type of jamming equipment.” It is unclear where Liptak got his device from, but his letter to the school board describes YouTube videos that show users how to make their own home-made jammers.
Liptak was previously reprimanded in 2013 after he used violent questions on a test referencing the velocity of a student thrown against a wall by a teacher and the mass of a car running over a baby.
Source: Ars Technica
