DETROIT – Detroit teachers who organized a “sick out” today could be putting their jobs in jeopardy, district officials warned.

Teachers at Gompers Elementary-Middle School, Bates Academy, Paul Robeson Malcolm X Academy, Detroit College Prep Academy at Northwestern, Ann Arbor Trail Magnet Middle School, Bagley Elementary School and Cody Medical Community health Academy apparently thought it was more important to make a political statement than to educate students Thursday.

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District officials were forced to close the schools for lack of educators after a large number organized a stay-home protest against Gov. Rick Snyder’s plan to save the chronically failing, cash-strapped school district. The plan calls for splitting the district into two entities as a means of dissolving debt and returning control of the district to local officials by 2021. DPS has been under state control since 2009, CBS Detroit reports.

“The District has the right to review suspected abuses of sick leave. Any DPS teacher calling off on personal illness in connection with any reported ‘teacher sick-out’ will be subject to a review of their actions,” Detroit Public Schools Emergency Manager Darnell Early said in a statement condemning the sick out, according to WXYZ.

“The review will include requiring medical documentation to substantiate the illness in order to determine whether the reported time was legitimately charged as personal illness. Failure to provide documentation may result in the absence being without pay, and further disciplinary action being taken in accordance with district policy,” he said.

High school math teacher Nichole Conaway told the Detroit Free Press hundreds of teachers are “completely sickened” by benefit cuts and shaky job security, so they’re ditching kids for the day.

“The sickness is spreading and it’s contagious,” she said. “Who knows where it will go until the root cause is remedied.”

Today’s sick out follows a similar stunt by teachers staying home at three schools Dec. 2, according to the new site.

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Conaway told the Free Press teachers are unconcerned by district officials’ threat to investigate their sick leave.

“That threat is meant to scare teachers, and I think it just angers many teachers even more,” she said.

“One day’s pay is a risk that I think people decided they were willing to pay,” Conaway said.

Today’s sick out drew mixed reactions for locals.

An unidentified Gompers student told CBS Detroit he’s worried about how the missed day of instruction will impact his already shaky grades.

“My reading teacher said that we had a paper due today and I have a whole bunch of missing assignments that I’ve got to make up and this was the day so I hope I don’t get F’s on that,” the boy said.

His parent said he supports the teacher protest.

“They deserve every dime, especially with these politicians – they can write a bad check and call it a perk,” the parent, who was not identified, told the news site. “We write a bad check and they call it a felony, you know, they’re stealing all the money from the teachers.

“It’s crazy,” the parent said.

Political consultant Tim Skubick thinks the sick out will likely backfire.

“Not to pass judgement on what the teachers are doing, but I can pretty well predict that in the legislative process, particularly among Republicans who are in no mood to help Detroit from the get-go, this is not going to help,” he said.