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The price of mentoring? Why this Florida teacher is being fired

Samantha Major, a teacher at Boca Raton Community High School, is being fired because the school district says she developed a close relationship with a girl she mentored and cited the Bible while giving advice about her personal life.

BOCA RATON, Fla. — Samantha Major is a teacher whom a supervisor once dubbed “an absolute powerhouse of compassion, kindness, thoughtfulness, professionalism and excellence.”

Now she's been banished from the classroom, relegated to months of paperwork duties in a school bus depot, targeted for criminal investigation and slated for termination. The county school board will consider the proposal to fire her Wednesday.

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Her dizzying reversal of fortunes is, in large part, a story of the pitfalls that await teachers who make extended efforts to aid troubled students.

It is also one of how public schools push teachers to make extra efforts, often with little guidance or preparation, and then leave them to face the fallout.