PORT ARTHUR, Texas – A Port Arthur ISD football player says an assistant coach paddled him three times after he missed school and wore the wrong color pants to practice, raising questions from his family about discipline and parental consent.
Noah Lopez, who attends Memorial High School in Port Arthur ISD, told KPRC, KSAT’s sister station in Houston, that the punishment happened less than a month after he joined the team.
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Noah said he had missed school because he did not have a ride after his mother was seriously injured in a crash. He also said he wore the wrong color football pants to practice. According to Noah, the coach was also upset because he did not have Noah’s phone number.
“It just really hurt real bad,” Noah said. “I was running across the room, going in circles, and everybody was just laughing. And I was like, dang, like, come on bro, it’s already embarrassing, I’m getting hit.”
Noah’s father told KPRC that neither he nor Noah’s mother gave permission for the paddling.
“The way they did it, you know, it was like an assault,” Henry Lopez, Noah’s dad, told KPRC. “You know, they didn’t let me know. I don’t even whoop with my son.”
The Texas Education Agency said it has a zero-tolerance policy toward misconduct that threatens student safety. The agency also said parents can report school safety concerns to the TEA.
Port Arthur ISD said, in part, that district policy does not require a parent to provide advance written consent before corporal punishment may be administered.
According to the Education Code, parents or guardians must sign a written statement and send it to the board of trustees of their district to prohibit the use of corporal punishment on their children.
It is not yet clear whether the family has filed a formal complaint with the district or the state. Parents with safety concerns may report them to the Texas Education Agency.
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