High School Students Protest Absence of Assistant Principal

A growing and mysterious controversy at has come to a head this week: The long-time, unexplained absence of Assistant Principal Adam Bakr.

Bakr, an administrator at the school for several years, has been out for almost two months and without any sort of explanation, said students. 

There has even been a "Bring Bakr Back" Facebook page created that features messages from students and supporters of the administrator, along with copies of emails and petitions asking the school and city officials to bring Bakr back.

There are also several photos of Bakr and even a video of a sit-in that students recently staged demanding answers to the absence.

As of this post, nearly 450 people had "Liked" the page.

The page's creator and several others, however, expressed concern that the effort, initially meant to show support, had gotten out of hand when students and others began contacting local and regional media outlets. 

"My tiny little spark has caused a huge forest fire... in no way whatsoever did I have intentions to bring the media into this issue. I felt like writing emails was perfectly fine..." said the page creator, who went on to claim that more than 400 such emails on the issue have been written to .

School officials have not responded to multiple requests from media for interviews, including Fox 25 in Boston.

"This is a human resource issue and we have no comment," said Pope when asked for comment by Marlborough Patch. 

As of this post, students were planning additional sit-ins, including one on Thursday, Jan. 26.

There is also a petition online that organizers say will be sent to the Marlborough School Committee.

"In late 2011, assistant principal Bakr was put on administrative leave," says the petition. "Bakr has earned a lot of respect from the student body throughout his years of being an assistant principal. If it was not for him, a large amount of students would not have graduated. He is someone who everyone looks up to and someone who everyone generally loves. Bakr needs to be where he belongs, doing what he loves, helping students reach their full potential, and that place is Marlborough High School."

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