Officials at Golden West College said Monday, March 5, that they are looking into whether comments a professor made on a video posted online, in which she appeared to tell a Long Beach couple to “go back to your home country,” violated the school’s policies.

If they do, the professor’s remarks could result in some type of punishment, said Letitia Clark, a spokeswoman for the Coast Community College District, which operates Golden West.

“We want to make our students and alumni feel proud, and this does not make them feel proud,” she said.

Clark said school administrators learned about the video on Saturday. That’s about two days after a Long Beach man named Tony Kao posted it on Facebook.

In his post, Kao says he filmed the video as he and his wife were out for a walk with their baby.

“We encountered a bigot and a racist today in our neighborhood in Long Beach,” Kao’s post says.

Kao wrote that the woman walked by them and casually told him and his wife to “go back to your country,” before the couple started recording. After the camera is rolling, the woman objects to the filming and starts walking away.

“I want you to tell everybody why you told us to ‘go back to our country,’ ” Kao says.

“You need to go back to your home country,” she replies.

“And what’s that mean?” Kao shoots back.

Toward the end of the 29-second video, Kao calls the woman’s comment unbelievable.

“We’re born and raised in the United States, and you told me to go back to our country,” he says.

Since Kao posted the video on Thursday, it’s accumulated 400,000-plus views.

Commenters on the video identified the woman as a professor at the Huntington Beach college. It was unclear how that link was made, or if someone just recognized her.

After the woman was identified, angry students, alumni and others started contacting Golden West, according to Clark. She said the district had received several dozen calls by Monday. Many more people have contacted the school on social media, she said.

Over the weekend, Golden West posted a statement on its own Facebook page: “It has recently come to our attention that there was a video posted on Facebook of a GWC faculty member making comments that the college does not condone or support. Golden West College believes in an inclusive and welcoming environment for all students.”

Clark said the professor in the video, Tarin Olson, has been in contact with her supervisor at Golden West. She doesn’t dispute she’s the one shown in the recording, according to Clark.

Olson and Kao did not return messages from a reporter on Monday.

Olson has worked at Golden West since 1991, according to Clark. She said Olson is teaching four career-planning classes at the college this semester.

Olson has volunteered to stay away from campus for the rest of the week, Clark said. In that time, campus officials will try to determine if Olson’s comments violated school policy and what action should be taken.

“It’s hard for me to be able to concretely say that there’s (going to be) some punishment. I can’t say that unequivocally,” Clark said. “But I can say that the administration and the leadership does take this very seriously. They’re not waiting for it to die down without taking any actions.”

In a followup statement sent late Monday, the district said it expects faculty to abide by an ethics code that requires employees to conduct themselves in a way that “shall be worthy of the respect and confidence of the community the district serves.”

“Employees should, therefore, avoid conduct which is in violation of the public trust or which creates a justifiable impression among the community that such trust is being violated,” the statement says. “We deeply regret that the words expressed were painful and hurtful to our students and all of the supportive members of our community.”

On Sunday, Kao posted his own followup on Facebook that encouraged others to speak out if they experience racism but asked them not to use his post to foster anger or hatred.

“We have NO intention of seeking out or besmirching the offender’s personal life or career,” Kao said. “It is our hope the offender is aware and apologetic for what she has said to us, but all we can do is hope. Although my post was about something negative, the message we want to convey is POSITIVE and that is to be respectful to one another no matter of what race, creed, or color.”