A teacher at a French Catholic school in Ontario has been relieved of her duties after allegedly forcing a student to eat food from a trash can.
When third grade student threw an old banana in the trash, Renee Oettershagen, the teacher, got it back out, ate a piece, and then "instructed my granddaughter to eat the rest," said the girl's grandmother, Ann Marie Stewart.
According to ABC 17 News, the teacher claimed she was only trying to teach the young girl about wasting food and the value.
“It is the most bizarre, abhorrent thing I could ever think of doing to a child," said Marie.
Yahoo! News noted that a meeting was held the next day in which the school principal stated that the incident was not too big a deal. This upset the family of the student even more.
Apparently, this is not the first time Oettershagen has forced one of her students to eat from the trash can. In previous situations, the teacher had collected sandwiches from the trash and insisted that the student eat it in front of her classmates in order to teach students that food should not be wasted.
The Children's Aid Society of Haldimand is investigating the incident and Oettershagen has been fired.