Ye ran his private Christian school with all kinds of peculiar rules, including only providing sushi for lunch and not having classes on the second floor due to the rapper “being afraid of stairs,” two former teachers said Thursday.
The allegations were made in a Los Angeles County Superior Court lawsuit by the pair of instructors, who claimed they were wrongfully terminated by the rapper formerly known as Kanye West from his now-shuttered Donda Academy in Simi Valley.
In addition to the employment allegations, plaintiffs Cecilia Hailey and Chekarey Byers painted a troubling picture of life inside Donda Academy.
School doors were locked from the outside, lunches were always sushi, no forks or other utensils were allowed, students had to sit on the floor during lunch, there were no cleaning services or school nurses employed and medications on campus were either unsecured or expired, the plaintiffs said.
All classes were on the first floor because “he was reportedly afraid of stairs,” according to the civil complaint.
“I’m extremely sad about all of this. It was such a huge honor and privilege to work at Donda Academy for Kanye West. I’m a huge Kanye fan. His first album was the first I ever purchased,” Byers said in statement.
“I still enjoy his music, and I’ll never deny his talent, but while his vision for the school sounds great on paper, it’s just pure chaos and mutiny. It’s like a mental hospital being run by the patients.”
Donda Academy abruptly closed down in October 2022 amid fallout from antisemitic remarks made by the rapper and fashion mogul.
“Kanye West is clearly as bad at running a school as he is at managing his own personal and professional life, enabling an unsafe and illegal school environment for students that also discriminated against the plaintiffs based on their race,” said plaintiffs’ attorney Ron Zambrano.
“These egregious violations at Donda Academy are just another example of West’s unusual behavior, and our…
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