In this week’s sign that America is clearly wheezing its last ethical gasps, a teacher at a Florida daycare was sacked just hours after she found and extinguished a fire that was burning at the daycare facility.
Events transpired on Wednesday afternoon at Little Temples Childcare in the Jacksonville suburb of Arlington, reports WTEV.
During naptime, the teacher, Michelle Hammack, smelled something smoldering in an adjacent classroom. Turns out, it was chicken nuggets in an oven.
“I just leaned over and peeked around and there was a fire in the oven, and I ran in there and opened it to try to put it out, and the fire alarm started going off,” Hammack narrated to the Jacksonville CBS affiliate.
The teacher then hurried back to her classroom to gather her napping charges and ferry them all outside.
Other teachers performed a head count outside. Hammack returned to the building to check for any stray kids.
“When I got to the third classroom by the kitchen,” she said, “I could see that it was just a contained fire in the oven.”
So, she claims, she put it out.
Mere hours later, the owner of Little Temples Childcare, Olga Rozhaov, sent the teacher packing.
“I fired her only because she left her room,” Rozhaov said, adding that protocol strictly requires that a teacher to be with students at all times including when they are sleeping.
“It’s not acceptable, and if anybody else does the same thing, I will fire again,” the boss guaranteed. “I will fire them. No question.”
Rozhaov did admit that Hammack may have prevented property damage, or worse.
Naturally, Hammack doesn’t like the outcome.
“I didn’t start the fire,” she noted. “I put it out.”
When firefighters arrived, they cleared away the smoke (which only took a few minutes) and deemed the daycare facility safe for habitation.
Apparently at the behest of a WTEV reporter, the local Department of Children and Families is investigating.
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