SEATTLE – A Seattle high school teacher was shown the door recently after she was busted for drinking and failing to properly supervise students on a school field trip this spring.

Garfield High School veteran teacher Carol Burton was fired from Seattle Public Schools Friday based on a district investigation into a field trip with students to New Orleans in March, when two girls reported they were groped by a male classmate, The Seattle Times reports.

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The popular choir teacher told ABC 7 she admitted to school officials she had a few drinks over the course of the 5-day trip with 39 students and admitted to ignoring district rules about allowing boys and girls into each other’s hotel rooms during the stay.

“I had 2 ½ alcoholic beverages on this trip and they are, without a doubt, the most expensive drinks I’ve ever had in my life. They are costing me my career,” Burton said. “And for some reason those two drinks seem to be more important than 14 years of service.”

Superintendent Larry Nyland confirmed in a statement that Burton violated the district’s field trip policy by “allowing chaperones to consume alcohol, allowing boys and girls inside each other’s hotel rooms, ignoring curfew and no random room checks conducted after curfew.”

Burton told King 5 after a meeting with district officials in June that the boy alleged to have groped two girls during the field trip had a prior history of problems school officials failed to warn chaperones about.

“The school shouldn’t of allowed this child on the trip,” she said. “The school district had background information about his past experiences. The sad thing is the young man deserves a chance too. He’s been ostracized and demonized and he needs help.”

The Times reports the student was expelled from another school for a similar incident.

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Parents have rallied behind the teacher since the incident, calling her termination excessive and demanding a lesser punishment, according to media reports.

The district investigation into the New Orleans trip revealed most of the parent chaperones consumed alcohol in New Orleans, and one “had to be assisted by two of her fellow chaperones” back to the hotel after a bad reaction with prescription medication, according to a 32-page district report cited by King 5.

Burton told the site she didn’t explicitly state male and female students could mingle in each other’s rooms before curfew, but chaperones “didn’t enforce” the rule.

Two female students later complained that a male student – identified as “student 1” in the district report – “repeatedly touched their breasts and buttocks in public and also while he was in their rooms prior to curfew,” King 5 reports.

Burton told ABC 7 she offered to take a 10-day unpaid suspension and give up privileges to host field trips for three years as part of a proposed “last chance” employment agreement, but district officials opted instead to fire her.

The teacher said she plans to appeal her termination.