Subtle and Overt Racism in My Son's School

by Melissa Kramer
 

As I sit down to write this and really think about the racial climate within the schools from a more personal perspective, I realize that there have been many subtle moments as well as more overt ones. The first that comes to mind is an incident that took place when my now 8th grader was in 2nd grade. 

For pre-k through 1st grade, he was in a private school. When we moved into a house where we’d be paying higher taxes, we decided to switch and try the public school as our district is one of the better ones. Within the first month or so, his teacher sent a note home stating there was some concern with his reading and that he would need to work with someone one on one daily to help advance his reading and assess the situation. Both his father and I were a bit perplexed by this because his previous school had given no indication that there were any issues. But we went along with it because we wanted to be open and gain more understanding. Pretty quickly, the teacher reached out and apologized because she realized she had made a mistake and that our son was in fact reading at grade level and she somehow misread the situation when she was assessing him. Now this may seem innocent on some level…a mere oversight. The problem though is that my son was a very rambunctious kid who was always finding himself being reminded not to talk so much or goof around during learning time. Then you throw in the fact that he’s a Black boy, it becomes the ingredients for all types of conclusions and assumptions, which I believe is what happened here. 

This is a typical example of “unconscious bias.” The teacher very likely had no clue or intention to target my son but because of these overarching biases, expectations and stereotypes of Black boys in particular, it’s hard not to question what was at the root of this circumstance. The thing is, I’ve always made a very conscious decision to keep an open mind and not jump to conclusions when it comes to race and dealing with racist people, notions or circumstances. With that being said, I feel that because of that, when it presents itself, I know it’s real and while difficult to explain at times - you just know when you know and this moment, I’ve described was definitely one of those. 

The more overt incident took place at my son’s school in 2017 when the fifth graders (he was in 3rd grade at the time) were given an assignment to create posters advertising slave auctions as part of their Colonial America lesson. All of these posters were then placed on the walls outside of the classroom for everyone to view as they walked by each day. Some of the posters included language such as, “Anne, aged 12 years, a fine house girl.” These were part of posters created to replicate those of the runaway slaves which showed Black women and men with dollar signs/rewards attached. There were complaints to the school immediately and the whole thing was pretty intense. So much so that CNN covered the story along with several other media outlets. Of course, they were pulled down and the superintendent sent out an announcement stating they would address and come up with different learning strategies to teach this particular section. The thing about it for me that was so disturbing is the utter and complete cultural ignorance and insensitivity for all of the students, regardless of race but especially for those who were Black. Children should not be asked to recreate the most painful part of their history in a classroom setting. The fact that this occurred only a few years ago was pretty astounding and truly disheartening for myself along with many other parents. The fact that there was no consideration of how children of color might feel walking by these posters is outrageous and beyond understandable. 

In summary, I live in a community that praises itself as diverse and progressive and yet within our school system, we’ve got a lot of issues that need to be addressed to reflect this. There is not enough sensitivity nor knowledge of some of the most basic cultural issues. Until there’s a plan in place to completely disrupt and shift all of the curriculum and approaches to teaching American history in particular, the climate will remain the same.