Parents at a California elementary school were angered after a string of racist incidents in which Black children were sent racist cards by their classmates.
One girl received a drawing which read, “You’re my favorite monkey”, while another stated, “To my favorite cotton picker”, reported KTLA.
The mother of the student who received the drawings has now removed her from Upland’s Pepper Tree Elementary School.
And the parents of another Black student told the station that children in the class had told her daughter they were going to give her a drawing that stated “You’re my favourite slave.”
“They said that they were going to give her (a drawing) that specifically said, ‘You’re my favorite slave,’ and they were going to show her as a slave hanging from a tree,” Maylana Douglas told KTLA.
Rome Douglas also said that a group of girls at the school had told his daughter they were going give her massages and back rubs as art was Black History Month.
“And apparently, someone told her, well, maybe only half the month because you’re only half Black,” he said.
Last year a teacher in the city, which is 40 miles east of downtown Los Angeles, was placed on leave for making anti-Asian comments during the Lunar New Year.
Two weeks after the latest incident, the school district released a YouTube video condemning the incidents.
“I want to make it perfectly clear that we have a strict zero tolerance policy on any type of hate speech, harassment,” said Upland USD Board President Sherman Garnett.
And in a statement, the school district added: “An investigation took place immediately upon learning about these disgusting, racist drawings students gave to another child in their class … The content in those cards is shocking and abhorrent. We deeply regret that our student has had to endure the hurt that race based bullying causes.”
