Every B-day last year, as the sixth-period bell chimed throughout Grant High School, two dozen students prepared to go to David Burmester’s Medical Interventions class. They took their seats and readied themselves for the onslaught of insults, beratement and belittlement that was soon to come. “He’ll start the class making fun of someone,” one student says, “He’ll start the class hating on someone.”
“You’re just waiting for him to snap,” says another.
According to students in the class, Burmester regularly yelled at, swore at and insulted them. He called them different variations on the word “stupid,” students say. Students say he picked favorites and targets at the beginning of the year, and the difference in treatment was stark.
“He picks who he’s gonna like, who he thinks is smart and who he thinks is dumb, and doesn’t change that for the entire year,” says one student.
Burmester created a classroom environment in which students felt scared, angry, on edge and uncomfortable, students say. When they walked into the classroom, they immediately knew whether or not Burmester was in a good mood, and good days were few and far between.
“You can just tell by his body language that he’s in a bad mood,” one student says, “It’s like, do not talk to him, keep your mouth shut.”
Grant Magazine spoke with six Medical Interventions students, on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, and three others who consented to being named. All of them say that Burmester behaved inappropriately and disrespectfully towards students for the duration of the year, and that he targeted specific people in the class.
Burmester declined to speak with Grant Magazine after an in-person appeal for an interview and two emails.
In addition to Medical Interventions, Burmester teaches Principles of Biomedical Sciences and Next Generation Science Standards Biology. Student testimony suggests that Burmester was particularly harsh with his Medical Interventions students. Students in his other classes say that while some of his behavior was a little out of the ordinary or abrasive, it didn’t sink to the same levels that it did in Medical Interventions.
His alleged tendency to treat certain students more favorably than others, though, remained. One Biomedical Sciences student says, “I feel like he definitely picks favorites.”
Burmester is the only Medical Interventions teacher, which means for high schoolers working to complete the Health Sciences Pathway, which has college credit attached, there is a large possibility that they have to endure his treatment not once, but twice during their Grant careers. The pathway requires students to take three classes: Principles of Biomedical Sciences; Anatomy and Physiology; and Medical Interventions.
“I feel scared to go to his class because I feel like I get almost like dehumanized,” says one student.
Five students recall that Burmester on at least two occasions brought a dog-training clicker to class and clicked it at students while saying things like “sit” and “good girl.”
Hazel Spoons, a senior in the class, says, “He did it exclusively to girls.” Three other students say the same thing.
Spoons says the incident was shocking. “I think we all gaslit ourselves into thinking it didn’t happen,” she says, “I was sure that was, like, a dream.”
In another instance, Spoons describes going up to the front of the class to ask Burmester a question before a test. She barely opened her mouth before he started berating her, she says. “He just yelled at me, saying, ‘Shut up,’ and then he said, ‘Needy, needy, needy, you’re so needy.’ And he just kept yelling ‘needy.’” Spoons says that rather than trying to get an answer to her question, she just sat down and failed the test. Another student corroborated Spoons’ description of the incident.
On a separate occasion, Spoons went into Burmester’s class at the end of the first semester to check in about her grade. She explained to him that she was going to complete a missing assignment after school, and that it would be turned in by 11:59 p.m., the deadline listed online. Burmester told her that the assignment was now due at 3:00 p.m., which meant that Spoons wouldn’t have the necessary time to complete it. “I told him that (it was due at 11:59) and he was like, ‘Well, I changed my mind,’” she says.
Spoons started crying. “He was like, ‘For you it’s due at three. For you it’s due at three,’” she says. Her voice cracked as she tried to explain to Burmester that she had set specific time aside to complete the assignment based on its posted deadline, she says.
Then, according to Spoons, Burmester started making fun of her. “He was mocking my crying,” she says. “He was talking the same way I was talking, like whispering in my voice, like cracking, while having this conversation.”
Spoons says that Burmester continued to talk about her even after she left the room. “(One of the other students in the room) told me that he was, like, yelling about me when I left.”
Burmester didn’t let Spoons forget what happened. The next semester, he brought up the situation in class: “It was a little subtle thing that only I would notice, but he just said something like, ‘Oh, this will make Hazel cry,’” she says.
Spoons isn’t the only one who has been brought to tears by Burmester. “I’ve cried so many times after his class,” another student says, “I cry before his class. I get panicked.”
The same student alleges that Burmester told them that they belong in “one of those places with crazy people” because they had a missing assignment. The student responded by saying, “You mean a mental hospital?” Burmester allegedly said, “Yeah, one of those.” Several other students corroborated the account.
The student also says that Burmester told them they were destined to work at Walmart for the rest of their life.
Other students say that Burmester regularly talked about their classmates when they weren’t in the room. “One day he was like, ‘Where’s (student name)?’ And I was like, ‘(They’re) not here.’ And he said, ‘Oh, she’s a lost cause, she’s not going to make anything in life,’” says one student.
Senior Ian McCandless filed a report with Grant administrators after Burmester allegedly berated him with swear words in front of his classmates on May 18. He came to class two minutes late after working with another teacher during a Flex period. McCandless was going to ask Burmester if he could go back to that teacher’s class to finish getting the help he needed on an important assignment, he says.
“I stood off to the side, and I was just waiting patiently.” He says that he did not say anything before Burmester started yelling at him. “He goes, ‘For f—’s sake, what the f— do you want?’” McCandless says.
Burmester called him childish and disrespectful, at which point McCandless walked out. “I kicked the door stopper out so the door would close and he couldn’t come after me. I thought he was gonna come yell at me. He does that stuff.”
Senior Dylan Dinh corroborated the incident. After McCandless left the classroom, Burmester kept talking about him. “He was mocking him and making fun of him and definitely cursing at him,” Dinh says, “Just saying different things about him and calling him childish.”
Multiple students described that particular incident as a breaking point. The following class period, there was a substitute for Burmester, and McCandless says he asked every student in the class to file a report to hold their teacher accountable. “Everyone said yes and like, ‘That absolutely needs to be done,’” McCandless says.
Medical Interventions students say that some of Burmester’s most egregious behavior came when they simply asked questions about material being taught. Since much of the work Burmester assigned was self-directed, a lot of questions inevitably arose. “He mostly gives us packets, and we have to teach ourselves the whole time, and all these questions will come up,” says McCandless.
Several students say that they were scared to ask questions or even speak in class. “I just don’t talk to him if I can, for fear of social ridicule,” one says. “It’s the worst thing ever.”
A student who took Burmester’s Biomedical Sciences class for a semester expressed a similar but less severe sentiment. “(He) wouldn’t really give you answers. Like if I asked him a question he would say it was in the sheet and act like I was dumb for asking the question.”
According to Medical Interventions students, Burmester seemed to find humor in insulting and disrespecting students. “He kind of gets a little chuckle out of it,” Dinh says.
Referencing Burmester’s use of the dog clicker, McCandless says, “It’s his sense of humor. Like, he’s making a joke out of (the student), and he’s the only one who’s finding joy out of it. It’s creepy.”
One Biomedical Sciences student remembers Burmester making an odd joke during a dissection in class. “This girl asked what we were dissecting, and he told her we were dissecting her.”
Sometimes, students say, it seemed like Burmester was trying to use cruel humor in an effort to create more casual relationships. “He never had that connection with any students, and he would just make jokes that no one thought were funny and made everyone uncomfortable,” one student says.
Several students also told Grant Magazine that Burmester’s conduct made them feel embarrassed. Dinh and McCandless describe how Burmester called members of a specific table group “the slow kids.” In reference to the incident, McCandless says, “He was intentionally trying to humiliate that table group.”
Multiple students also characterize Burmester’s behavior towards specific members of the class as flirty. “He’s always been super weird towards some girls,” McCandless says, “I don’t know if he’s flirting with them … I don’t know any other way to describe it.”
Concerns about Burmester have been brought to Grant administrators at least twice in the last two years, and it’s unclear what, if any, discipline has been handed down.
Dinh says he filed a report after Burmester threw a pen at him in his Biomedical Sciences class during the 2021–2022 school year. “He missed, but, like, he threw it hard.”
After Burmester threw the pen, the insults started, Dinh says. “He just started calling me ignorant and stuff like that. Like saying, ‘What are you doing?’”
Another student and their parents emailed administrators about Burmester after having him for Biomedical Sciences during the 2020-2021 school year, which was entirely virtual because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“My mom sent an email to admin talking about how he would be teaching without his camera on and just not (exhibiting) good model teacher behavior,” the student says, “And it’s the same type of really rude things he always does.”
Both students say nothing came of their complaints, and that to their knowledge, Grant administrators never followed up with them or Burmester. However, had any disciplinary action been taken, the students would not have been notified, as that information is confidential.
“We take every claim seriously,” Grant Principal James McGee says.
Vice Principal Morgan Hallabrin declined to comment and Vice Principal Scott Roosevelt did not respond to multiple interview requests.
Since May 18, the day that Burmester allegedly berated McCandless, several students say they reported Burmester’s misconduct to Grant administrators.
Multiple students that Grant Magazine spoke with said they were worried that if Burmester found out they had been interviewed or made reports to administrators, he would retaliate by lowering their grade in the class.
One student cites such retaliation as the reason they didn’t file a report sooner. “I felt like if he found out, it would retaliate more onto me,” they say. “I was extremely scared about that.”
Proving that a teacher has retaliated is extremely difficult, a Grant teacher says.
There’s no formal process for investigating allegations of teacher misconduct, and discipline is rarely handed down, the teacher says. Investigations are conducted by building administrators, except in extreme cases, like sexual assault, when the district is involved as well.
According to multiple students, Burmester was not in any of his classes after June 1. A student in Medical Interventions says that substitutes took over and they wouldn’t tell students why Burmester was gone.
The contract between the Portland Association of Teachers and Portland Public Schools states that teachers can be placed on paid administrative leave or alternative assignment for the duration of an investigation, but only in specific cases.
Section 23.10.4 of the contract outlines the circumstances: “Paid administrative leave or alternative assignment should be limited to situations where: The presence of the employee in the workplace might tend to interfere with an investigation; There are concerns the employee will repeat the alleged serious misconduct; Removal of the employee from the worksite is appropriate to maintain the safety and security of students and/or staff; or The alleged misconduct is serious enough to result in dismissal, if substantiated.”
The last day of school for Grant students was June 14. For many Medical Interventions students, it couldn’t have come soon enough. “It puts a toll on you,” one student says, “He definitely should not be a teacher.”
