“And this happened in Florida. I get the feeling that somebody didn’t like him, and used this as an excuse”
Perhaps many of the student body are from a culture that takes magic very seriously and it spooked them. Chickens and goats are probably being sacrificed at this very moment to remove and possible curse the teacher placed on them.
As this took place in a city that's 95% white, I seriously doubt that there's a huge community of voodoo practitioners in the school system. These are probably just the clowns who burn Harry Potter books.