Montreal art teacher Mario Perron caught selling students' work online: report

Public school authorities in a Montreal suburb have launched an investigation into an art teacher accused of selling her students' artwork online for more than $100 each.

According to CTV News, Mario Perron's questionable extracurricular activities were discovered Wednesday by a student at Westwood High School in St. Lazare who discovered a web store featuring drawings he and others had created. The student told the teacher about it, and then this news spread throughout the school, the agency reports.

A parent whose 12-year-old daughter painted a “horrifying portrait” of Perron on four different websites, offering up to $151 Canadian — about $110 — told CTV they have serious ethical concerns about the situation and are “absolutely disgusted by Perron. Her child's photo can be bought as a print for $118, a T-shirt for $55 or an iPhone case for $35, she told CTV, which is “unbelievable.”

“Does this teacher require them to do some projects to sell?” said the parents. “Does the market require these types of portraits?”

Another parent said her 13-year-old son found a classmate's drawing of himself on Perron's website for sale. He called the situation “very disturbing.”

“It's unbelievable that he felt he had the right to exploit and exploit these children's rights and their artwork for his own financial gratification,” she told CTV News.

As of Saturday afternoon, about 92 student portraits were still available on Perron's web store.

The Daily Beast could not reach the school board on Saturday. However, a board spokesperson told CTV News in an email Thursday that school officials are “aware of the situation and … (we) take these allegations very seriously.”