Associated Press
Albuquerque, New Mexico – July 17, School leaders in a New Mexico district will not face federal sanctions for allowing a high school project on racism in which students posted signs reading “Whites Only” and “People of Color” above water faucets, federal officials said.
But the school district will have to implement procedures for addressing racial harassment claims and offer lessons about racial harassment to students and staff, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights said.
Students at Hot Springs High School launched the project last year for an English class focusing on social justice. The students hoped to secretly monitor the reactions of people when they viewed the signs. Other students tore down the signs within minutes.
Student Gabriel Reynolds, who is black, said the signs shocked and angered him. He complained that he was humiliated, and his family filed complaints with both the federal and state education departments.
School officials described the project as an attempt to explore America’s history of racism. The school, about 150 miles (240 kilometers) south of Albuquerque, had 426 students at the time, only seven of them black.
The district and the Office of Civil Rights signed a resolution agreement earlier this month that requires the district to develop and implement the new rules. The federal office found no violations of law, however, and said the educators would not be sanctioned.
Superintendent James Nesbitt said the district agreed with the federal agency that it needs a clear procedure for reporting problems.
“The development of a reporting plan is in keeping with the purpose of the student project that resulted in the Reynolds’ complaints, which was to address the issue of racial harassment with students,” he said.
Nesbitt and other educators reached a settlement with state officials in March. The state settlement said the student-initiated project created at least the appearance of discrimination and should not have been approved.
At the time, Nesbitt said he and others made a mistake in judgment.
Nesbitt and the Hot Springs principal sent Reynolds’ family an apology and publicly apologized. However, Susan Reynolds, the student’s mother, said she did not consider the apology sincere because the educators never acknowledged the project was inappropriate.
The educators agreed to take racial sensitivity training and had letters of reprimand placed in their files for 18 months.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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posted July 17, 2007 at 7:24 pm
Ms. Reynold won’t accept an apology from the principal, given publicly and privately? How much money does she want??? Unfortunately her son will probably have at least one experience where the discrimination will be real. This world is still not color blind.
I’m glad the school wasn’t sanctioned, as there was no reason to do so. This was an approved English class project, done to teach children what racism was like in America. (and still is). If the students had announced they were going to put the signs up, there would have been nothing to study…no reactions. This reminds me of a study done many, many years ago with a teacher who had students divided by eye color, blue and brown, and had one group discriminate against the other, to teach how racism feels. No one sued or complained about that!
So the educators will take their racial sensitivity training and their letters of reprimand will be placed in their files for 18 months. All will be well.
Oh, having lived in the deep south during the ’50′s and ’60′s, those signs would have read: “Whites only” and “colored”, not “people of color”.
posted July 17, 2007 at 8:39 pm
Interesting article and it does on the face of it seem like not worth getting real upset about, but I’m not in a position to actually judge that.
But what is the connection to religion here? Or the importance, for that matter?
Is this a mole-hill someone’s trying to inflate?
posted July 18, 2007 at 10:08 am
Those who do not learn fro history are destined to repeat it.
History doesn’t repeat, but it often rhymes.
All of this tells me that it is good to conduct experiences like this, simply so teens can see what their parents and grandparents experienced. However, I would have suggested a discrete period of time (a few weeks at most), followed by an explanation and opportunities for debriefing. Interviews with the students, staff (who would have been expected to enforce the “rules”) and faculty (who would get the heat for the project) would benefit everyone. Even the parents would be part of the project, as well as school board members and other civil leaders.
Why is this a religious issue? All justice and injustice is a religious issue. Justice is one of the most major themes in the entire Bible. It’s NOT about who is going to heaven. It IS about who eats at the table with you. If some folks truly believe that the Realm of God may be at our finger tips (Old School, “The Kingdom of God is at hand”), then all it takes is opening the gates a little wider and inviting folks to the table. That is justice – cafeteria style, sacramental style, and community style.
posted July 18, 2007 at 10:40 am
The experiment the students tried, and backed by instructors, on the issue of racial-harassment gave them the reaction they were seeking to find. A young black student was offended and reacted along with his family. Being not only black and the minority of number in that school I don’t think this would have been too hard to figure out without an experiment. Mistakes in judgment are made sometimes; in this case corrected by having classes in Racial Sensitivity training for the instructors, thereby the students will benefit from this training. The parents would do well to understand that only good was intended, even though it was a bungle job.
posted July 18, 2007 at 11:39 am
Where’s Al Sharpton. He should be all over this like “white on rice” (excuse the pun)!!