Karma? NJ school board member Zoom toilet gaffe

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Frances Cogelja resigned on Tuesday

A NEW Jersey school board member resigned after accidentally broadcasting herself going to bathroom in front of 150 people on a Zoom call, reports say.

Frances Cogelja, a trustee on the Hackensack Board of Education, mistakenly left her laptop camera on while she relieved herself in front of her colleagues and students on Monday.


A Zoom meeting attendee took a photograph of her on the toilet during the meeting

During the virtual meeting, Cogelja was seen sitting on the toilet while her camera was activated during the fraught conference, the Daily Voice reported.

The board recorded the Zoom meeting and the link was posted online but the toilet incident occurred during the public comments portion of the evening and is not featured.

The small thumbnail showing Cogelja was on another screen which wasn't recorded – but one eagle-eyed viewer who saw the live image took a photograph and posted it to a message board.

After her bathroom break, the New Jersey board’s vice president, Scott James-Vickery, told Cogelja: "You need to go."

"We’re here trying to get work done while you’re sitting on the toilet," he raged during the tense meeting.

The board had rejected Cogelja’s attempt to have their election date moved from April of next year to November before her toilet break.


The trustees have until January 29 to fill Cogelja's vacancy

She resigned on Tuesday, effective immediately, and the trustees have until January 29 to fill the vacancy.

Last year, Cogelja told the district’s acting superintendent she was "disgusted and appalled" that LGBTQ history would be added to the syllabus.

In a series of emails, she reportedly told acting Superintendent Rosemary Marks that she didn't agree with the new state law requiring schools to teach about LGBT history by September 2020.

Cogelja said an “alternate lifestyle narrative is being shoved [down] our children's throats” and repeatedly asked how she could opt her child out of learning about this topic, according to North Jersey.

"I have every right as a parent to not have my child participate in something that I do not think is suitable as part of a public school curriculum," Cogelja reportedly said.

"I believe conversations having to do with sexuality should be had at home between parents and their children."

She later apologized for her comments.