A teacher at Winterville Charter Academy in North Carolina has resigned after telling black students in her eighth grade English class that they would have been her “field slaves” if not for the Constitution.
According to the Associated Press on Constitution Day, the teacher had Black students in her class raised their hands. She then told the students they would be her “field slaves” were it not for the Constitution.
Annastasia Ryan the school’s principal sent a memo to 8th grade parents saying action was taken after a “racially insensitive lesson.”
“On Monday evening, it was brought to the attention of school administration that a racially insensitive lesson regarding the importance of the Constitution of the United States was carried out during an English lesson on Constitution Day,” the memo reads.
Ryan said officials conducted an investigation and “the teacher was supported in turning in her resignation and will not be returning on campus.”
Ryan was forced to send out another letter on Oct. 5, this time to all families after a heated discussion between parents on social media began about the incident.
“As soon as we were made aware…we immediately took action,” she wrote in the memo to parents, according to WITN. “The result was a teacher resignation.”
However, some parents believe that the school should have done more. They accuse school officials of trying to “brush off” the incident and only addressing it now because it went public on social media.
Kanisha Tillman, a parent whose child was in the English class told AP this is not the first time students made complaints about racist incidents at the school. She cited one occasion where Black girls were explaining why it is racist to compare Black people to monkeys when a teacher walked by and allegedly told the students, “It’s O.K. You’re all my little monkeys.”
In another instance, a white student called a Black student a “monkey.”
“When the Black student educated him on that being racist and him not liking it and not to call him that and asked the teacher for support, the teacher turned around and said to him, ‘Oh, it’s OK. We’re all a little bit racist,” Tillman said.
The Black student then called the white student a “cracker,” to which the teacher responded with a threat to write up the Black student for disciplinary action.
A spokesperson for National Heritage Academies, the parent company for the school said school leadership “is currently working to address ongoing concerns from parents that racially insensitive student remarks continue.”
