Awareness of Microaggression

Is it discrimination or perceived discrimination?

I left an administrative meeting with several other administrators.  As we walked through the playground there was one teacher running around playing with the kids and three teachers sitting under a covered pavilion. The head administrator of the organization specifically calls out one of the teachers sitting under the pavilion and tells that teacher to get up and go play with the kids.  After we walk inside, the administrator tells me that teacher is always sitting and has been told several times before to be actively engaged with the children while outdoors.  Then asked me to formally talk with the teacher to discuss the issue.  I went back, called the teacher inside, and formally addressed the concern.

The next day the teacher seeks me out to tell me that was an act of professionalism and discrimination.  Unprofessional because something was said in front of others and discriminatory because nothing was said to the other two teachers who were also doing the same thing.  The teacher who was addressed was Latino, the other two teachers were white, and the administrator was white.

Was this actually an act of discrimination or was it just perceived by the teacher as a discriminatory act?  Could the administrator have had invisible discriminatory feelings towards this one teacher or was it simply the fact that this teacher had been told several other times while the other teachers had not been talked to about the issue before?  If that is the case, why were the other teachers not addressed at the same time?  What are my responsibilities at this point to respond to the teacher who feels discriminated against and to the administrator, who is over the organization and my direct supervisor?

I believe there are times when we may say or do something that may be unequal or unfair based on a personal bias against an individual, a group, or because an individual belongs to a certain group.  I also believe that there are times people feel discriminated against because of an aspect they may have, yet it is not true.  For instance, someone may say I didn't hire them because they were too fat, the wrong religion, of a certain ethnic background, etc but the reality may be that there simply was someone else more qualified for the position.  How do we determine when something is an act of discrimination and when it is not?