Embattled St. Paul teacher retires after controversial Facebook posts

The St. Paul teacher whose Facebook posts put him at odds with Black Lives Matter St. Paul has retired from the St. Paul Public Schools.

Theo Olson, who was suspended for two weeks without pay this spring after a district investigation, reached agreement with the district to step down on Aug. 18.

The district, in return, agreed to restore five days of Olson's pay and to remove three letters from his personnel file — a move that keeps from public view the reasons behind its earlier disciplinary action.

Olson, a special-education teacher at Como Park Senior High School, had declined to discuss the district's rationale when he told the Star Tribune in June that he'd returned to work after being suspended, but not at Como Park High. Instead, he said, he was "subbing around the district."

In March, Black Lives Matter St. Paul criticized Olson for posts it claimed portrayed students as drug dealers and gangbangers.

The group also unearthed and publicized blog posts he had written describing the frustrations faced by a fictional teacher, "Mr. O'Shea."

His wife said then that the blog, Hot-spvrr, was an effort to show "what it's really like" to be an inner-city special-education teacher and that the depictions of classroom life were a "mash-up" of experiences and characters.

Olson had been a teacher in the district since August 2000.