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A St. Paul teacher is under fire after she made an offensive joke about the Holocaust.

According to Hazel Park Middle School Academy officials, the 8th grade English teacher sent an e-mail titled 'Torture Time!' via interoffice mail to alert other employees about a Holocaust simulation she was planning for her class next week.

In it, she wrote the Feb. 13 exercise was going to be a 'day of sheer pleasure for the staff being themselves as Nazi Officers and becoming Adolfs.'

"She was trying to be sarcastic and amusing," said the school's principal Coleman McDonough.

It further explained the students would wear yellow stars, similar to those Jewish people were forced to wear by Nazi Germany during World War II.

The e-mail stated the reason for the simulation was to give 'staff need[ed] stress relief and entertainment.'

"It was insensitive. It was flippant. It didn't maintain the level of respect and reverence that should accompany a topic like the one we're talking about," McDonough said.

The school noted that no students or parents received the e-mail and were surprised to learn 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS was given a copy of it.

It is the second year the teacher has conducted the simulation, which requires parent approval to participate.

McDonough said the teacher is 'disappointed' she made light of the Holocaust, in which six million European Jews were killed.

"The e-mail that we're talking about was in poor judgment," McDonough said.

The school said they would internally discipline the teacher, but wouldn't detail her potential punishment.

The Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS they will work with educators at the school to better understand the Holocaust, but did applaud the fact the school wanted to bring light to the event.

Hazel Park Middle School Academy is located at 1140 White Bear Avenue and is part of the St. Paul Public School District.