Private New York school agrees to diversify after "mock slave auction" incident

The Chapel School, a private school in Bronxville around 15 miles north of New York City, has agreed to initiatives for diversifying its faculty and student body after a recent investigation by the NYAG's office.

The problem reached a boiling point in March after a teacher at the school conducted a "mock slave auction":

Quote:

The investigation found that in March, in two separate fifth-grade social studies classes, a teacher asked all of the African-American students in each class to raise their hands, and then instructed them to exit the classroom and stand in the hallway. The teacher then placed imaginary chains or “shackles,” on these students’ necks, wrists, and ankles, and had them walk back into the classroom. The teacher then instructed the African-American students to line up against the wall, and proceeded to conduct a simulated auction of the African-American students in front of the rest of the class. These “auctions” reenacted the sale of African-American students to their white counterparts. The investigation found that the teacher’s reenactments in the two classes had a profoundly negative effect on all of the students present – especially the African-American students – and the school community at large.

That teacher was subsequently fired after parents' complaints about the incident, but a state investigation revealed a prior history of parental complaints about incidents of racial insensitivity and discrimination at the school which were never addressed by administrators.

I've heard of some positively brain-dead exercise ideas by teachers before, but I have to say that one truly takes the flatline cake. What on Earth did he possibly expect fifth-graders to absorb from that reenactment, and could he truly think of no better way to convey that message than by humiliating his students?

via International Skeptics Forum http://bit.ly/2Wbc2wA