Coach fired for helping organize immigration protest

A JV baseball coach at Chavez High School has been fired for helping students organize an immigration protest. Rudy Rios made copies of a flier students put together syaing Latinos should band together in opposing proposed changes to U.S. immigration law, but making copies of such material is against school policy and the flier contained a four-letter word. Oops.

Rios said he made the copies to help the students unite and he didn't mean any harm against the school by doing it. He said he plans to appeal his dismissal and has gathered dozens of signatures from baseball players, students and teachers who support him. "They're like, 'When are you coming back? We need you, we want you.' To me, that's why I can't let this die," Rios said.

An HISD spokesman said the dismissal was appropriate.

Update: Turns out KHOU misreported the story, sort of. Rios wasn't fired altogether; he was just stripped of his coaching duties, according to the Chronicle. And blogHouston has the text of the flier — we just want to apply one big (sic) to the whole thing.