Two weeks ago a group of students at Park Hill South High School in Riverside, Missouri began circulating a petition online calling for the return of slavery.
The school’s principal Kerrie Herren said a student brought the racist petition to the attention of officials. “Students brought it to our attention right away. The reporting culture at Park Hill South is working.”
“We are outraged, hurt and saddened that this occurred,” Herren added in statement. “This is not who we want to be at Park Hill South. Our differences make us stronger. We do not tolerate discrimination or harassment.”
“It doesn’t matter their intent, the impact is real. The impact is being felt, the hurt is real and there,” Herren said of the students who started the petition.
District officials say it was a small group of students involved in the creation and signing of the online petition, and the culprits’ identities are known, according to the Kansas City Star.
However, student privacy law prohibits officials from providing more information. The students involved could face suspension or expulsion as a result of breaking the district’s code of conduct which prohibits attacks against people based on factors such as race, gender, religion, disability or other personal characteristics.
This is not the first time the school has been criticized for issues involving race.
Last September, Herren ran on the court before the start of a volleyball game to demand that members of the school’s team take off their T-shirts that said, “Together we rise” with three fists of different races raised in the air.
The school’s athletic director allegedly told the students that if they allowed the “Together we rise shirts,” they’d have to allow KKK shirts as well.
“I could not believe they were comparing a KKK shirt to a message of unity,” a senior on the team told reporters at the time.
Two weeks after the pro-slavery petition, parents and students are still angry .
Julie Stutterheim told CNN that her daughter, who is Ethiopian and has experienced racism first hand, is “very upset” about it. “The more she talked about this, the more upset she got.”
The Park Hill district had a student population of 11,767 this school year, of which about 12.7% were Black.
