ASHEVILLE, N.C. – A North Carolina civics teacher was forced to apologize for student-made signs that hung outside his classroom as part of an assignment because they offended immigrant students and parents.

One sign read “America is for Americans.” Another one said, “Illegals Go Home,” the Citizen-Times reports.

Erwin High School teacher Jesse Reeck was brought to tears as she apologized to an angry mob of parents and community members who gathered at the school Wednesday morning demanding answers after learning about the posters through social media. Sydney Dandreaa sent several pictures of the posters to WLOS ABC 13 through Facebook.

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Reeck said the posters were part of a civics assignment in which students were asked to come up with “a reflection of what we see today on the news in the presidential campaign and in the world around us,” according to the news site.

“I want to apologize to everyone who has been hurt by my poor choice to post our class assignment in the hall,” Reeck told parents. “I am deeply sorry for the pain I have caused to students, parents and community members.”

“I made a serious mistake in posting the assignment in the hall outside the background and the context and the safe environment that we have created inside our classroom,” she said.

The Associated Press reports the meeting was scheduled to last about 30 minutes, but parents refused to leave until they voiced their concerns, dragging out the gathering until 9 a.m., well past the start of school. And many demanded to know what repercussions Reeck will face for posting the student assignments.

Joshua Ramirez, who alleged he was suspended last year because he spoke Spanish in class, vowed to pursue the recent incident as a catalyst for “change.”

“We’re not going to let this go at all,” barked Ramirez, who graduated in 2014. “We’re just all fed up, and this is a time for change, for our change.”

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Some parents also complained that interpreters hired by the school to translate for parents who don’t speak English were not always immediately available, while others attempted to argue that the issue sets some sort of precedent in America’s race relations.

“There are so many racist people out there, and if you make it OK at a public school you are going to make it OK everywhere,” Hendersonville resident Bianca Figueroa told the Citizen-Times. “So, honestly, what most of these people (attending the meeting) want is just to stop it here.”

Students held a protest over the allegedly insensitive class assignment earlier this week and posted a video of their screaming antics online. In the video, students initially just yell and boo and take cell phone videos, before eventually they eventually chant Mexico over and over.

The students also apparently waived a Mexican and Honduran flag, which they later told the media was stolen, the LaVoz De Houston website reports.

“Students had a Mexican and Honduran flag at the protest yesterday and it was taken. Superintendent claims nothing was taken #livefromErwin,” Ashville Blog tweeted yesterday morning.

The student protest video posted to Facebook by student Karen Ramirez has been viewed more than 12,410 times. Ramirez also posted a second video, from the Wednesday meeting, in which members of the public berate school officials in Spanish.

Erwin High School Principal Jim Brown framed the Wednesday meeting as a beginning to a longer conversation about discrimination in the district, ABC 13 reports.

“I think today’s forum was a chance to explain to these folks what happened and I think we did a pretty good job of doing that. I just think they brought a lot of emotion to the meeting today and sometimes when emotion comes into the dialogue you lose the ability to be constructive,” he said.

“We have a non-discrimination policy. It is not the intent of the school to discriminate against any kid. These posters that went up on the wall as part of this class activity, I think was a catalyst that got this conversation going.”