Teacher facing discipline after awarding 1st grader ‘class clown’ and ‘most talkative’

A first-grade teacher has been disciplined after awarding one of her students two awards: “Class Clown” and “Most Talkative” during an end-of-year honors ceremony at the school.

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She also handed the student, Hayden Albert, a red clown nose, KLFY reports.

Hayden’s family believes that the teacher, Jessica Bordlee, used poor judgement.

"This woman publicly humiliated my great nephew and family. It is the teachers job to instill confidence and positivity in the child at a very early age (not just the parents)," Travanon-LaTosha Alexis posted on Facebook. "I am appalled because she really went above & beyond to try and have her audience to join in with her to humiliate my great Nephew but the audience was too embarrassed themselves while witnessing such behavior from a woman in power of little children."

Alexis said that the room went silent when Bordlee handed out the certificates. She wrote that Bordlee called Hayden back on stage to make him put on the red nose.

Alexis suggested Bordlee could have honored the first-grader in a more positive way, by giving him a certificate for being a “future motivational speaker” rather than “most funny.”

An official with the Lafayette Parish School System told KLFY that the way Bordlee presented the class clown award was concerning and said she displayed poor judgement. The district is weighing some sort of discipline for the teacher.

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