Teacher’s Binding of Pupil With Tape Is Probed

An Alhambra teacher has been put on paid administrative leave after taping a sixth-grader’s mouth and binding his hands for talking too much, district officials said.

Barbara Cser, a mathematics teacher at Ramona Elementary School, allegedly wrapped masking tape around the head and eyeglasses of the student, 12-year-old Solomon Poch, on May 7. He was not injured, according to a statement by Alhambra police.

School administrators had Cser apologize to the boy in front of the class the next day. She was put on administrative leave last week while the district investigates the incident, said Natalie Lee Gaither, spokeswoman for the Alhambra Unified School District.

In response to a report filed by the school, Alhambra police will also investigate to see if Cser committed any criminal violations.

Cser could not be reached for comment.

The student’s parents were not concerned about the incident.

“We feel the incident was the result of poor judgment made in a joking environment,” the boy’s parents said in a written statement translated by 18-year-old Victor Poch, Solomon’s older brother. They did not wish to be identified.

“We believe there was no malice involved. We do not want to see a good teacher and a school’s name blemished because of an isolated incident that does not truly reflect on how safe Ramona School really is,” the parents wrote.

That didn’t satisfy Peggy Tapia, whose daughter Sarah is in Cser’s class. “The teacher should have been removed immediately,” said Tapia, whose complaint triggered the investigation.

Other parents had differing opinions about the incident.

“I never do this in my house with the children,” said Mary Soto, who has a second-grader in the school. “Nothing like this,” she said, crossing her wrists behind her back. “Not like a dog. They’re not animals.”

“It was crossing the line,” said Marcel Adjibi, the father of a first- and second-grader. “She had guidelines to follow. She was trained. If she doesn’t comply, she’s not fit to teach.”

But Dolores Solis, whose daughter, Sara, is a third-grader at Ramona, said she trusts the teachers at her daughter’s school.

“I don’t think it was done out of meanness,” she said.