A post that went up on the news blog “Contrarian Boston” over the weekend, and quotes Newton Teachers Association President Mike Zilles talking about priorities, has a lot of people outraged.

The post, written by David Mancuso, reports that Zilles told union members at a recent school convocation that when it comes to prioritizing teacher responsibilities, students should be “in the mix, but don’t put them first.”

The “Contrarian Boston” post went viral locally, with Newton Facebook pages and advocacy groups, in addition to candidates for office, sharing it along with a flood of outrage.

The post—which includes comments from School Committee candidates Ben Schlesinger and Jonathan Greene—concedes that the quote by Zilles is secondhand, shared with the blog by people who were at the event.

“It’s not clear what the context was for Zilles’ puzzling comments, or what he intended, for that matter,” Mancuso wrote.

On Monday, the NTA released a statement calling the blog post “disinformation” and stating that the comment by Zilles related to taking lunch breaks (which are contractually obligated) was taken out of context. The NTA also called out the candidates who granted interviews to the Contrarian.

Full text of NTA statement is as follows:

“Newton educators care deeply about their students, and they work tirelessly to meet the needs of every child, every day. Often, they meet these needs at great cost to themselves. Educators are expected to be martyrs who quietly pick up the slack, day after day, for the city’s unwillingness to fund the services it is expected to provide.

For example, special educators set up their class schedule prioritizing small groupings of students with similar needs to avoid putting large groups of students together whose needs are very different. They do this because they do not believe they can fully meet the needs of their students in these larger groups. They therefore set up their schedules putting students first, and do not schedule lunch or preparation time for themselves.

This is but one of countless examples of how the Newton Public Schools are built upon the everyday sacrifices of its educators.

The comment being quoted by the Contrarian was taken out of context from asking educators to ensure that they have a lunch—to schedule their lunches before scheduling their students.

The commitment of Newton educators to go above and beyond has concealed from the community the extent to which they and their children are getting much more than the district intends to provide. Our statements at Convocation recommend to our educators that if their students need something that cannot be met with the provided resources, they work with the union to advocate to the district for those resources.

Teaching today is hard enough without also doing the work that the district takes credit for, but does not pay for.

Additionally, we are disappointed that two School Committee candidates have dignified this publication, which has a long history of half-truths and anti-educator rhetoric, with an unquestioning response. School Committee members owe it to Newton’s families to work with our educators, not embrace transparently false attacks on them that further fray the fabric of trust in our community.”