Teachers at CedarBridge Academy called a halt to lessons yesterday morning after a student who made vulgar comments was allowed to return to the classroom.

Students were sent home because their teachers were involved in a meeting to discuss the 14-year-old boy.

Bermuda Union of Teachers (BUT) president Lisa Trott said the sexually vulgar statement was a blatant violation of the Student Code of Conduct. Originally the teenager was suspended for five days, but returned to the school within 30 minutes because an appeal of the suspension had been launched. The Ministry of Education decided to allow the student to continue his education until his appeal hearing.

Teachers were less than happy about the move and invited Chief Education Officer, Dr. Joseph Christopher, to come to the school. Dr. Christopher did not and it was decided by 10.35 a.m. to send the students home because teachers were still discussing the matter.

BUT president Lisa Trott said that yesterday was not the first time the student in question had failed to abide by the code of conduct laid out for students. "This student has received eight disciplinary referrals since October of 2005, including referrals for fighting, disrupting class, insubordination, disrespect, misuse of electronic equipment, refusal to follow school rules, profanity, verbal abuse and sexual harassment," she said yesterday.

The boy is said to have advised his friend, who was being addressed by an educator at the time, to "Tell that teacher to suck your balls".

Ms Trott said the comments made yesterday were unacceptable. While this student brought frustrations to a head the abuse was not an isolated case, Ms Trott said.

"On a regular basis teachers and students are being disrespected, verbally abused, physically threatened and on more than one occasion sexually harassed.

"No one else would be expected to put up with that in a work environment. It causes a great deal of stress, particularly when teachers feel like they don't have any support from the Ministry with regard to eliminating this element.

"These are constant infractions by a certain number of students. This behaviour is hindering the progress of students in our building. In addition, these types of behaviours create an unhealthy and unsafe work environment for our teachers and would not be tolerated in most other work environments."

She added that teachers are fed up with a certain number of students impeding the progress of other students. She said they would not continue to teach in classrooms that threatened their physical and emotional health.

"It is important to note that teachers are well aware of our responsibility to our students and we today in this action challenge the Ministry to support us in our efforts to provide a safe work environment and take serious steps towards providing a wider range of educational opportunities for our students," she said. "We believe that much of the frustration displayed by our students is as a result of being forced into a one-size-fits-all approach to education."

Late yesterday afternoon the Ministry of Education issued a press release confirming that teachers had held a meeting during school hours. Principal Kalmar Richards understood that the meeting was over inappropriate conduct and the Ministry's decision to return a suspended student to school pending a hearing of the appeal. "I appreciate the concerns of the faculty at CedarBridge Academy, and I want to assure them that the disrespect of our teachers will not be tolerated," Education Minister Terry Lister said. "There are policies and procedures in place that allow for due process to occur. All efforts will be made to address and resolve the concerns."

While CedarBridge Academy Parent Teacher Student Association (PTSA), president Karen Belboda did not confirm whether or not she supported the teachers' action ? until she met with other parents? she did say the situation was a potential "powder-keg".

"It has the potential to be very volatile," Mrs. Belboda said yesterday. "Things need to be worked out. We all need to come together. Parents need to be in on this too."

But Ms Trott said parents needed to understand why the action was taken even though their child might not be the one acting out in class. "It is not good enough for parents to say, 'I'm not worried about it,' because rest assured, that student's behaviour is impacting your child's learning," she said. "This action is our only recourse for implementing change."

When visited the school administrative staff said CedarBridge principal Kalmar Richards was not able to speak to anyone for the rest of the day and asked the press to leave the premises.

CedarBridge student Lorisa Burchall was not happy about getting sent home early.

"It is going to set us behind. It inconvenienced us a lot," Miss Burchall said in a parking lot of the abandoned mega-school. "The teachers should feel ashamed that they went on strike today of all days. They had the meeting first thing in the morning. That inconvenienced the whole school." It was not known yesterday whether or not CedarBridge students would be able to go back in school on Monday. "At this point, we are not sure," BUT president Trott said. "We have invited the Chief Education Officer to come meet with the teachers to have this issue resolved at this time, this has not happened. The teachers will decide what will happen from here on in."