A Morristown High School teacher is out of a job after tenure charges were upheld last week, following a 2024 incident in which she allegedly hit a student and locked him in a classroom.
Hui-Tzu (Isabella) Chen was suspended from her position in June following an “inappropriate altercation” with a 14-year-old male student in March. She was terminated last week after the state Department of Education published an opinion backing the Morris School District’s allegations, following hearings in October.
Department records state Chen prevented a student from exiting her classroom, struck his arm and initially failed to comply with a school resource officer’s attempts to intervene. Chen told investigators she was attempting to get the student to complete an assignment she believed he had copied from a classmate.
“When the student failed to comply with Ms. Chen’s direction to stay after class and review his worksheet, Ms. Chen’s decision to insist upon his staying and to physically prevent [the student] from leaving her classroom to go to lunch violated the prohibition against unusual punishment,” reads the decision from arbitrator James McKeever, who affirmed the district’s finding that Chen’s actions were “unacceptable.”
Morris district Superintendent Anne Mucci confirmed that Chen was suspended without pay after charges were filed on June 12. In accordance with New Jersey statute, Chen’s pay was reinstated after 90 days while the suspension remained in effect.
Her termination became effective with McKeever’s decision, which was published on Jan. 6.
Arbitrator details Morristown HS confrontation
According to McKeever’s 14-page opinion, the confrontation played out like this:
Court records state Chen was a tenured teacher, employed in the district since 2017, when on March 13, she directed the student to remain after her Mandarin language class to review a worksheet assignment she believed the boy had copied. His attempt to leave led to a confrontation about the assignment in which she “physically blocked him from leaving,” the arbitrator found.
During the confrontation, Chen allegedly struck the boy on the forearm and “pulled the magnet from the door” − a reference to a device used to prevent anyone from entering the room during a lockdown. As students attempted to observe through the door window, she blocked the view to prevent them from watching, investigators wrote.
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The student later called a friend to intervene and Chen allowed that student in the room, where he saw Chen “grabbing and hitting” his friend. Contacted by that friend, a school resource officer identified only as “Officer Little” responded to the scene. Little told investigators he saw Chen “yelling and physically blocking the interior view of the locked classroom door in order to prevent anyone from looking into the classroom and to prevent [the student] from leaving.”
Little said that when he told the student he could leave for lunch, Chen tried to block the door again, but relented when instructed by the officer a second time. Principal Mark Manning removed her from the classroom later that day after she admitted she “may have” slapped the boy’s forearm, and “did not express any remorse for the incident.”
During the subsequent investigation, Manning reported that Chen had been previously “found guilty of an incident wherein she made fun of a student for being overweight in front of the other students in her classroom, a violation of the district’s policy against harassment, intimidation or bullying,” McKeever wrote.
“Ms. Chen endangered the health, safety, and well-being of a young high school student with her aggressive, violent, and frightening and fear-inducing conduct,” the arbitrator concluded.
Teacher’s attorney responds
In an interview Monday, attorney Ronald Ricci, representing Chen, said his client was “disappointed with the result” and “surprised” with the arbitrator’s finding that she did not show remorse.
“She just wanted the kid to finish his work and not fall behind,” Ricci said. “Mandarin is like math, once you fall behind it’s pretty hard to catch up. She never intended to hit the young man.”
As described by the New Jersey Principals and Supervisors Association, tenure status is designed to protect teachers from being dismissed from their positions due to “unfounded, flimsy or political reasons.”
Teachers protected by tenure cannot be dismissed or reduced in salary except for reasons of inefficiency, incapacity, unbecoming conduct or other just cause. In those cases, when tenure charges are filed, a hearing must be held to determine the final outcome.
