A call for action: Parents demand accountability as concerns grow over racism in area schools

Lubbock-area parents are escalating their fight against racism in two local school districts, calling on the districts to do more to combat bullying and discrimination and detailing next steps in their ongoing battle to end bigotry in South Plains schools.

At a series of gatherings Thursday, parents and civil rights leaders expressed their frustration with Lubbock-Cooper and Slaton independent school districts after the school boards last week both adopted resolutions decrying racism and explaining steps the schools say they have taken to fight discrimination on their campuses. The parents said the districts' statements were too little, too late, with one LCISD mother calling them blatant lies.

Rev. Todd Yeary, who serves as a pastor and civil rights attorney in Baltimore, Maryland, spoke at a news conference Thursday hosted by the Lubbock NAACP and the Intercultural Development Research Association. He said the resolutions are "rhetorical flourishes on cheap paper, coordinated on the same day, almost like somebody copied off of someone else's paper and didn't do a good job."

"If we were to call this what this is, it is a poor attempt to avoid accountability," Yeary said.

"The fact that (the Lubbock-Cooper school board) blatantly lied and said that there were no complaints this school year was really disheartening," Tracy Kemp, who says her son has experienced racial bullying, said at the news conference. "I really put faith in the school board that they would do the right thing, and that lets me know that they made statements and comments just to save face."

More: Slaton ISD responds to concerns with resolution condemning racism

Just hours after the news conference at Mae Simmons Community Center and another rally that preceded it at Patterson Library, many of the same parents and activists spoke at a Slaton ISD Board of Trustees meeting where they demanded accountability.

"The things (Slaton ISD has) done mentally, physically, emotionally — y'all broke my children. I need some damn accountability," JaQuatta Manahan said at the board meeting. "This isn’t a protest. This is a cry for help. This is a cry for change. We aren't promoting violence. We are asking simply for accountability."

Manahan, a Slaton parent, says her daughter Autumn was unfairly disciplined for a fight that resulted from daily racial harassment from other students at Slaton High including the use of racial slurs. Manahan says district administration did nothing to stop the bullying and is now calling for Superintendent Jim Andrus' termination.

"I asked you to put on your big boy drawers, and sit at the table and have a conversation," Manahan said. "This is y'all's leader and he continues to lie," she said of Andrus.

Slaton ISD abruptly announced Monday school would be canceled on Thursday and Friday in addition to the previously scheduled Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday the following Monday. Andrus told local media the dismissal was in celebration of MLK Day, but also in response to Thursday's gatherings and a social media threat.

"Individuals who are not yet known to us (but appear to be from out of town) have posted on TikTok that the high school should be shot up," Andrus said in an email to parents.

Andrus said SISD has involved the FBI in investigation of the threat.

"I've never seen a school district have the gumption to claim an affinity with Dr. King's national holiday as a false justification to give cover to their cowardice and blame it on the people," Yeary said in response at Thursday's news conference.

The Lubbock-Cooper and Slaton school districts' resolutions and activists' strengthened push for accountability come amid a barrage of racism complaints against the two districts beginning in April and most recently making national headlines in December, the Avalanche-Journal previously reported.

Allegations of racism in LCISD surfaced in late April when an Instagram account bearing the district’s LCP logo and images of Black students from Laura Bush Middle School with accompanying racist text was discovered.

More: Lubbock-Cooper ISD leaders condemn racism, announce new policies

Following the Instagram incident, the 100 Black Men of West Texas, a local advocacy group, released a statement asserting LCISD harbored a "culture of racial intolerance, ignorance, racial bullying, and bigotry that the school administration seems to tacitly allow and ignore." The district responded, saying in part that "all racist behaviors, statements and actions are deplorable and have no place in our schools" and denying The 100’s claim that racism has been "swept under the rug," the A-J reported at the time.

Tensions have escalated recently with federal complaints and subsequent state and national news reports in December highlighting the alleged racism within the two districts. Speakers at a Dec. 12 school board meeting said LCISD has failed to take action to curb racism in the district, which is about 3% Black.

IDRA and Lubbock NAACP leaders Thursday proposed a series of concrete measures they request Lubbock-Cooper ISD and Slaton ISD take to resolve the alleged racial discrimination problems on their campuses.

The measures include revising the districts' anti-harassment, anti-discrimination, anti-bullying policies and student codes of conduct, providing additional training to staff and instruction to students, creating a student committee and district working group to prevent harassment, establishing a process to review disciplinary actions against Black students and publishing an annual report summarizing instances of race-based bullying and harassment in the districts.

In addition to proposing measures intended to bring change, several Lubbock County parents — including Lubbock-Cooper moms Tracy Kemp and Shardae McGaha and Slaton aunt Mary Pegues — are joining together to create Parents Against Racism, a pact of parents partnering to promote fair treatment in schools. Kemp said the group will be available for anyone who needs help or support in battling bullying and discrimination in education.

"If you have an issue, if you have a complaint, if your child is being discriminated (against), we want to help you. It doesn't matter what color your child is or how they identify or what you believe in," Kemp said. "We believe that all children deserve the right to be at school and to be treated fairly, and we just hope that our experience and our struggle was the sacrifice so that no other child should feel this way."

Lubbock-Cooper and Slaton families, in partnership with the Lubbock NAACP and IDRA, have filed formal complaints with the U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights detailing the racism allegations against the two school districts. David Henderson, one of the attorneys who authored the federal complaints on behalf of the families, said parents are now just waiting for the Office of Civil Rights to commence its investigation.

"I know they've received what we've written to them, and I know they've got it on their desk, but we're waiting for them to come in and actually start doing an investigation," Henderson said. He added he's also waiting for "the rest" of the response from Lubbock-Cooper and Slaton, noting the resolutions the school boards adopted do not go far enough.

"To Lubbock-Cooper, to Slaton: If I believe that everything you're saying is true, it took you eight months and 23 days to even begin to respond to claims of race discrimination that were brought to your attention. That's longer than a football season," Henderson said. "The fact that you responded to it lets me know that you realize you need to respond. We're waiting for the rest of your response."

"It's hard to think about studying when people are calling you a n----- at school," he added.

This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Parents demand accountability as concerns grow over racism in area schools