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On Jan. 15, 2015, Wilson was a substitute teacher for eight students at an unnamed Hutterite colony school. Witnesses said Wilson told some of the students they weren’t suitable for marriage, talked loudly on his phone during class time about a possible sale of guns, and belittled a student by telling her classmates to hit her in the head with a shovel if she was annoying, then dig a hole and bury her in the hole.

Students also wrote in their journals and testified they felt uncomfortable when the teacher forced a 13-year-old girl to skip and hula hoop in front of the class while the teacher stared at her chest.

Staff said his behaviour was deeply upsetting to students. The committee concluded he was disrespectful of their culture.

While substitute teaching at a different school in April 2016, Wilson told a group of students crossing the street by the school, “You boys better be careful.”

When a student pointed out one of the children was a girl, not a boy, Wilson asked the sixth-grade student if she was sure, then asked if she was transgender. Witnesses said he then called over a group of other students and polled them about her gender identity.

Earlier that day, Wilson had asked another student, unprompted, if her father was black.

A school counsellor testified the girl whose gender identity Wilson questioned was “forced to confront issues of her gender expression long before she was ready …”

The counsellor said the student became withdrawn and fearful after the incident, and her parents said she could no longer go to bed alone and will not use public washrooms unless she is with another female.